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The move is a response to a new GST policy that will apply 10% tax to all overseas purchases under $1,000 announced by the Turnbull government last year in a bi
by calliethrone 8y ago
The move is a response to a new GST policy that will apply 10% tax to all overseas purchases under $1,000 announced by the Turnbull government last year in a bid to “level the playing field” between Australian and overseas retailers.
- timeimp 8y agoNot so much "new" but "now enforced to all the things" Already happened with Valve. Buying from the store has 10% in the price, but not all prices changed.
- mikeash 8y agoWhy not collect the tax rather than banning Australians?
- imgabe 8y agoPresumably they will collect the tax when using the Australian Amazon site. It's not that Australians can't use Amazon at all, they just can't order from the US site to avoid the tax.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- jccooper 8y agoPresumably complying with the import tax is a PITA. Import/export usually is. Certainly it's more work than adding a redirect. There may also be some organizational lines being crossed; I can imagine the American site team doesn't really want to deal with Australian tax issues.
- exhilaration 8y agoThere are companies out there that will take care of collecting duties/taxes from your foreign customers, like https://www.i-parcel.com/ https://www.i-parcel.com/
- emodendroket 8y agoI'd guess the answer is they're not happy about the tax.
- tweedledee 8y agoIt does not level the playing field. A foreign company cannot reclaim GST on input cost. A 10% levy will kill the profit margin of the magority of businesses and make it impossible to compete in Australia. You are probably best creating an Aus subsidiary but then you open yourself up to accusations of transfer pricing. In addition it’s likely other countries will do something similar in retaliation and this will hurt Aus exporters. There is a reason why this wasn’t done earlier and it’s because it’s really stupid. Only big businesses can sufficiently amortize compliance cost and hire enough lawyers and accountants to transfer price away the profits to some tax haven. Small businesses will get hosed.