Australia to tax ALL international online purchases Australia's treasurer Joe Hockey has hinted that the mooted changes to the way the country's Goods and Services Tax (GST) is collected may apply to anything purchased from overseas, regardless of value. After much lobbying from Australia's retail sector, the federal government last week reached agreement with the states that …
OK so how on earth does our erstwhile treasurer expect to legally compel a retailer that is not subject to Australian law to go to the expense of doing tax collection? Especially when the purpose of the tax is to make its own products more expensive? There's a reason customs are the ones which collect GST on items over $1000.
Maybe Sloppy Joe should ask Amazon if they sell clues as he obviously needs to buy one...
Erstwhile treasurer has his hands on the internet connections/proxies/the great barrier firewall, the ISPs by the bollocks etc......
Erstwhile treasurer can simply switch of Amazon and since these customs and excise people seem to have the power to do as they please it shouldn't be too difficult for the treasure to get hs demands met.
I can, unfortunately, imagine that it won't be to difficult for him.
Personally I would like to see local business grow instead of die, I can easilly understand why local business have been lobbying.
The government can't switch off Amazon (or any other site) without getting sued into oblivion and dragged through the World Trade Organisation.
Local retailers have been screwing Aussies with limited ranges of products, loustly service, and massive overpricing for years - I can also see why they have been lobbying to protect their captured market.
The government has a very simple stick 'Verified Seller / Importer' program. If you agree to collect GST on products sent to Australia then GST your parcels will be fast tracked. If you opt not to join the program then packages will be delayed while GST is assessed. Pretty sure that will encourage major overseas retailers to join.
Most retailers are used to dealing with different rates of sales tax based on the destination so it should be a simple change and the retailer can earn interest on the 10% they hold for up to 2 months before paying the government.
How stupid. They didn't do it before because it costs more to collect than it makes. As for helping retailers here, it won't make the slightest difference. Adding 10% to overseas purchases makes no difference when local retailers can be anything up to 1000% dearer. Anyway what legal grounds does the Australian government have for forcing foreign companies to collect tax on it's behalf?
More work. More cost, No difference. A total waste of time and money.
"Anyway what legal grounds does the Australian government have for forcing foreign companies to collect tax on it's behalf?"
It doesn't, it won't, and they can't. There are existing systems in place of tax collections as they arrive from outside Australia. But as you said, after a phone call, and manual handling, good luck on making any money anymore.
The fault lies entirely on Harvey-Fucking-Abnormals who have been screaming for years that they're losing business through tax-free online options, and who also claim every local business who isn't part of the Harvey-Fucking-Abnormal chain is also a grey importer who are also undercutting them.
Boo fucking hoo, cry me a river.
"The fault lies entirely on Harvey-Fucking-Abnormals who have been screaming for years that they're losing business through tax-free online options, and who also claim every local business who isn't part of the Harvey-Fucking-Abnormal chain is also a grey importer who are also undercutting them."
Jerry was the first person to bring everything in from overseas destroying Australian manufacturing but is pissed now that he's being cut out of the loop.
Cry me a river.
Exactly.
And you have department store bosses bitching about this, apparently without any sense of irony, despite them being a major cause of Bonds moving their manufacturing overseas by forcing them to constantly drive down their wholesale prices until the simply couldn't meet them whilst still onshore.
I would say that you reap what you sow but when you sow enough lobbying dollars and stroke enough ministerial egos by purchasing tables at their events, well, it appears that they reap a subservient government.
No surprise there really.
I went into Safeway in Melbourne and found "Jordans Crunchy" - a favourite from my youth. "Reduced to clear" and still 25% more expensive than Tescos. It appears that granola is liable to VAT, so the Tesco's price includes 22% tax rather than the paltry 10% gst in Australia.
Australians companies are used to having an effective geographical monopoly due to their distance from the rest of the world. With the rest of the world in trouble, they've noticed the massive margins to be made in Oz and, well, times are a-changin'.
THIS.
The eBay's and Amazon's of this world aren't used as some sort of GST avoidance scheme. They are substantially more than 10% cheaper in most cases, are available at 10:30 at night, have detailed information about their products, user reviews and the like. No checkout queues (have you actually been to one of your shops Gerry? Do your sales team know what is available in the market or are they too busy pushing the lines offering the best bonus that month?)
Take something simple like a phone case for some modern smartphone. How much change do you get from $ 35? Now go to eBay and do the same. If you are paying more than $10 you probably weren't looking very hard. Jumping from $10 to $11 doesn't change the equation.
By all means, include online purchases for GST (and add healthcare and education while you are there). Then fix up the super tax concessions, CGT and negative gearing avoidance schemes. That'll fix your revenue problem.
Last figures I saw stated that it would cost 5 times as much to administer as it would raise. There must really be hope beyond reality that their will be a commensurate pick up from local retailers to break even. Admittedly that was for an "at the border" administered scheme - i.e. the only one that would work. Asking Amazon et al to collect your taxes is pie in the sky. They have zero incentive and Hockey has zero ability to pressure them. They know that if they did then everyone just moves on to the next retailer that doesn't.
The funny (not really) thing is all this crap the coalition spewed about "Mining TAX" this and "carbon TAX" that.
Implementing a scheme where multi-billion dollar companies digging up valuable resources from our country are subject to an increased royalty payment when (and only when) they are doing exceptional well, so that, as a country, we can all benefit from the unprecedented boom in the profits earned extracting and selling our shared resources is a tax an horrendous to behold.
Implementing a scheme where the detrimental effects of pollution are taken into consideration (but only fractionally) when calculating the price of those things that generate the pollution where upon the money earned is used to help offset the damage is a tax and unthinkable.
Making CDs and books and electronic devices purchased from "the Amazons" subject to GST collection, despite the only options for doing so being either unenforceable or economically unfeasible, is apparently totally good policy though.
Mining tax is a joke. When it's a Chinese owned mine selling to China, it's never going to be profitable (on the Australian tax returns anyway). Now they can bring in Chinese workers to run these mines, the country won't see a cent.
The government (and opposition) here are the biggest bunch of ass clowns in history.
Fuckwits.
Some of them are greedy fuckwits. Some of them are corrupt fuckwits. Some of them are unscrupulous fuckwits. Some of them are lying fuckwits. Some of them are hypocritical fuckwits. Some of them are bigoted fuckwits. Some of them are thieving fuckwits. Some of them are scheming fuckwits. Some of them are out of touch fuckwits and some of them are just plain stupid fuckwits.
But fuckwits all.
... considering that a lot of Australians buy from overseas because of price gouging differences, this may affect the Liberals popularity quite a bit. Expect to see some furious backpedaling in the months to come.
Paris - because she's more brains than Joe.
Won't worry them in the slightest. They were prepared to go against the whole country with mandatory data retention, GST on imports is a comparative non-issue. Tony and Bill are there to wave through a whole bunch of destructive legislation culminating in the TPP. When their job is done then we can expect the mea culpa's and the shuffling of seats but not so much on the back peddling. There is no mechanism for political parties to refund *donations*, there probably isn't even a word for it.
My guess would be that this is not so much to bring in more money from GST, but instead to make the process of buying anything from overseas so complicated that it's not worth bothering. This could be done by forcing the recipient to go to the customs office, in the middle of the city, in office hours, to collect the goods in person, after paying the appropriate fee in cash. The fee would probably include a processing charge of around $100 per package to cover administrative costs.
Considering that GST (and other applicable charges) are levied on goods that travellers bring in from overseas I would doubt that the ATO woudl agree.
Now restating the value might, but without reasonable evidence the ATO might decide that you paid Australian RRP. Also don't forget the ATO can access your credit card and paypal transactions.
Considering that GST (and other applicable charges) are levied on goods that travellers bring in from overseas I would doubt that the ATO woudl agree.
But there's a point - it'd be interesting if you get a $900 allowance at customs but a $0 allowance via online purchasing. They'd have to then drop the customs allowance to $0. The whole system then disappears up its own arse as it becomes totally unworkable.
Now restating the value might, but without reasonable evidence the ATO might decide that you paid Australian RRP.
Can't see that one standing up in court. "Your honour, the defendant bought item X from overseas at the full Australian RRP and paid for international delivery". WTF?
Also don't forget the ATO can access your credit card and paypal transactions.
Dude, seriously? Just about everywhere has prepaid credit cards these days. I just love all the bullshit trotted out about "department X can access all your transactions/records on Y etc". It's all horseshit. They can do that sort of thing for targetted individuals for major crimes - think "organised" - but they have neither the equipment nor the manpower to piss around finding online purchases on credit cards that were to an overseas company (hint: I've had Australian based companies charge via an overseas entity as I had to unlock my CC to make payment) that may or may not even have come into the country (overseas relatives?). Please stop believing the bullshit you've been spoonfed.
when the threshold was $500 (I stupidly bought a brass locomotive worth many more USD more than that ), the process was simple, the Post Office held the parcel until the GST was paid. I can see the the aggravation of having to line up behind pensioners & actually pay the GST while the local PO is open will quickly outweigh the convenience of being able to order at 10:30pm. I understand some of the courier companies are currently also whacking a processing fee for collecting GST ,
The convenience is the much lower price. When local is still 20+% dearer after GST added there's still a whole load more convenience headroom in that purchase. Books alone are normally double the price here compared to Book Depository. 10% on an $11 book vs $27 locally as one recent example.
Someone in AusPost would likely create a facility where you could pay the GST online with a couple of % ticket-clip. No queueing. Money still saved.
The writing is on the wall for local retailers.
NZ is also considering such moves. What annoys me is local retailers complaining that they can't compete. Well if they were fair priced to begin with then we would support them. I just ordered about us$100 worth of car parts from USA. Here in NZ the same parts would cost me about $1,000. None of the parts are made here in NZ and are all imported by the retailers anyway. How can they justify this kind of markup ?
I'll second that (for Australia). A while ago I needed a magneto for a piece of mowing equipment. The local Briggs and Stratton dealer wanted around $250. I got it from USA for $30 plus $30 shipping. When I queried that with my local supplier, he said that the price was set by Briggs and Stratton and they were forbidden from deviating or shipping in "grey" imports, on pain of losing their dealership rights.
I had the same story a few months ago with a starter motor for a piece of John Deere farm equipment. It was less than half the price from a US supplier (I ended up getting the old one overhauled - I needed it in a hurry).
I'm about to start overhauling the transmission on a Kawasaki utility vehicle and I'm getting the same story. A variomatic drive belt is around $100 from the US or around $250 here (each time originating from Japan). Similar price for clutch parts. I'd better get started on this job quickly before these new rules come in!
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