🏦 Banking when you leave South Africa: SA accounts, allowances and banking abroad

Banking is one of the first practical problems of emigrating. You need money to work on day one in a country where you have no address and no credit history, and you still need a working South African account for years afterwards. This guide covers what happens to your SA accounts when you leave, the exchange control rules for moving money out, and how to open an account in the UK, Australia or New Zealand before you have a permanent address.

For the cheapest ways to transfer money, see sending money to and from South Africa. For tax residency, exit tax and retirement annuities, see SARS and tax when you leave.

Keep at least one South African bank account

Closing everything feels tidy, but most people who leave South Africa regret it. You'll still need a rand account for:

• SARS refunds and payments, and payouts from retirement annuities, preservation funds or policies once you're entitled to them.
• Rental income and bond payments if you keep property, and the proceeds if you sell it later.
• Paying family, helping parents, and inheritances.
• Subscriptions, medical aid gap payments and anything else that runs by debit order while you wind things down.

Keep the account active with at least occasional transactions. Accounts that sit unused can be marked dormant and restricted, and reactivating one from abroad usually means FICA paperwork you'd rather avoid. Keep your South African cellphone number too (see the emigration checklist), because banks still send OTPs and app approvals to it.

Resident or non-resident account: what changed in 2021

Until 2021, leaving South Africa for good usually meant "financial emigration" through the Reserve Bank, and money was moved into special emigrant accounts. That system was phased out from 1 March 2021. Now the trigger is whether you have ceased to be a South African tax resident, which SARS decides under the tax rules, not the Reserve Bank.

• If you're still a tax resident (for example, you're working abroad but SA is still your home for tax purposes), your accounts stay ordinary resident accounts and you use the normal allowances below to move money out.
• Once you've ceased tax residency, your bank should redesignate your rand accounts as non-resident accounts. You can usually keep using them, but banks may limit some products, such as credit cards, overdrafts and new lending, for non-residents.

Every bank runs its own process, so ask yours what it needs. Standard Bank, for example, says its non-resident account is for people who have ceased tax residency and have a SARS Tax Compliance Status PIN for emigration, and its application asks for a certified passport copy, recent bank statements, proof of source of funds and a proof of address no older than 3 months. Other banks ask for similar documents.

FICA when you live abroad

The Financial Intelligence Centre Act (FICA) requires banks to know who you are, where you live and where your money comes from. Banks periodically ask customers to refresh their details, and they'll ask again when your status changes to non-resident. From abroad, expect to provide:

• A certified copy of your passport (and SA ID). Ask your bank which certifiers it accepts abroad: often a South African mission, a notary or a solicitor.
• Proof of your foreign residential address, such as a utility bill, council tax bill, lease or bank statement in your name, usually dated within the last 3 months.
• A tax residency self-declaration with your new country's tax number. Under the international Common Reporting Standard, banks share account information with the tax authority where you're resident, so expect this question.
• Source of funds or source of wealth documents for large deposits or transfers.

Update your address and tax residency with your bank as soon as you have a permanent foreign address. Leaving FICA out of date is the most common reason expats find their SA accounts suddenly restricted.

Moving money out: allowances and the SARS AIT

For South African tax residents, at the time of writing (October 2026) the main exchange control allowances per adult per calendar year are:

• Single discretionary allowance (SDA): R2 million. National Treasury doubled it from R1 million in the 2026 Budget, with effect from April 2026. It can be used for any legal purpose, including investing offshore, and doesn't need SARS approval, though your bank still reports the transfer.
• Foreign investment allowance (FIA): R10 million on top of the SDA, with a SARS Approval for International Transfer (AIT).
• Amounts above these limits need special approval through your bank (an authorised dealer) from the Reserve Bank's Financial Surveillance Department.

If you've ceased tax residency, you also use the AIT process to move your money out. Since April 2023, SARS has combined the old "emigration" and "foreign investment allowance" applications into a single AIT request on eFiling. You request a Tax Compliance Status, choose Approval International Transfer, and SARS issues a PIN that you give to your bank or forex provider. SARS asks for:

• Proof that you've ceased tax residency and the date it happened.
• Your capital gains tax calculation for the "exit tax" deemed disposal (section 9H of the Income Tax Act), explained in our SARS guide.
• A statement of assets and liabilities and supporting documents, including bank statements for the funds being transferred, which SARS says should generally be no older than 14 days when you apply.
• A separate application for each SARS-registered family member.

SARS's guidance says transfers of more than R10 million also need a manual letter of compliance. Your tax affairs need to be fully up to date before an AIT is approved, so file outstanding returns first. Because the rules and documents change, check the current list on SARS's AIT supporting documents page before you apply.