Amazon purchases and new GST Rules

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Originally Posted by FenceFurniture

It's a 3 year trial apparently.

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Seems a long time before it’s found guilty.

We can only hope that common sense will prevail, wait a moment, we are dealing with politicians and bureaucrats, therefore the sense won’t be common...

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Originally Posted by Bob38S

Seems a long time before it’s found guilty.

We can only hope that common sense will prevail, wait a moment, we are dealing with politicians and bureaucrats, therefore the sense won’t be common...

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,
The Common denominator is Just lower

If it costs 6 times more to administer than taxes collected... Guess who pays!

Yanks have a good word for it.... "Boondoggle".

Seeing this arriving on the shores of NZ in the next 12 months there is still significant uncertainty this side of the ditch re how / when / the cost of implementing it. Re Price Gouging and hiding behind GST etc - I'm still trying to figure out ( and awaiting an email explanation ) from a store that populates both sides of the ditch. I'l'll leave the name out as I'm more curious than accusative. It appears in buying it local, the list price compared to OZ has collected major margin shifts. My latest soon to be made purchase was for a JET 1200DC Canister setup for my new - long saved for home shop. The price here is approx $1650...Price in OZ is roughly $1060 NZ once converted. That's a whopping 61% difference in price for same product ( allowing for 5% GST difference..let's say 55% more ). I'm still not sure if the guy in NZ buys from OZ Parent company, ships it here, then adds a chunk or if he gets it the same price as OZ and a few containers stay on the ship and drop it off here. Either way I am still feeling like my hard cash is being sucked out of the wallet faster than I can make it. I shouldn't be able to purchase this in the UK from a retailer ( bricks and mortar), pay hundreds in shipping, pay GST, pay other customs fees etc and still be significantly better off than buying local from a specialist who I assume has a lot more buying power than me.

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Originally Posted by FenceFurniture

I've just looked through as much of the ATO and Home Affairs websites as I can stand for one session, and I've seen no mention of $300 whatsoever. No mention of $50 either.

However, what does stand out time and time again is that if the goods are >$1000 then the GST (and any applicable Import Duty) will be charged at the border, just the same as it currently is. That is to say that the retailer/freight forwarder etc DOES NOT charge the GST and forward to the Govt, but the receiver will be sent a First Notice by Aust Post, pay the GST and Duty, and then the goods will be released by AP for delivery.

What is not clear, or even mentioned by those sites, is what happens when purchasing from a retailer who DOES NOT sell more than $75,000 pa to Australia and who is sending a package that is less than $1000. Apart from eBay, Amazon, Lee Valley and perhaps a few dozen others, this will include a helluva a lot of retailers who are sending stuff here.

I can see giant cock ups coming out of this. For example, I have dealt extensively with Shipito over the years. Trying to get them to understand anything more complex than 2 + 2 = 4 is virtually impossible. I can just see them saying that GST has to be paid to them for ALL parcels, inc those >$1000. That will mean that Home Affairs will also demand GST upon arrival, the customer will have to claim the first GST back from Shipito, who in turn will deduct it from their next GST return to the Aust Govt.

Yeah right. That should go very smoothly indeed. Shipito are masters of hiding behind private agreements. For example they say Knives can't be carried by TNT, but TNT Australia says that's OK. Shipito then says "our agreement with the agent here says no". Same deal with wooden items or parts coming via Aust.Post.

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AP or someone has to store all this stuff while the paper work is done and the money confirmed as being paid. The system is that in the IMC (International Mail Centre at Clyde) all receipts from OS are put into AP specific wire cages called ULD's (unit loading devices) or simply a wire cage that gets forked onto a truck and then run through Sydney Parcel Centre. I will bet money that AP do not have enough ULD's to hold the parcels and nowhere near enough wharehouse space even if the do have the cages. The ramifications on the AP transport and delivery network are going to be huge and yet to be seen. The small packets delivered by the posties on bikes is going to be very interesting.

Have you all worked out what this is really about? It is simply to make one man wealthier than what he already is, nothing more and nothing less.

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Originally Posted by FenceFurniture

Shipito are masters of hiding behind private agreements. For example they say Knives can't be carried by TNT, but TNT Australia says that's OK. Shipito then says "our agreement with the agent here says no". Same deal with wooden items or parts coming via Aust.Post.

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Brett

I contacted Australia Post over the wooden items issue and they said there was no problem at all. I then went back to Shipito and confronted them. They said it was the carrier at the US end who would not ship timber. That was too much for me and I terminated my arrangement with them shortly after that explanation.

Regards
Paul

https://www.woodworkforums.com/f43/us...34#post2093147

I've just posted this in the other thread dealing with overseas purchases after 1 July 2018

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Originally Posted by ian

I've just received notice in one of my news feeds that the US Supreme Court has overturned a ruling dating from the early 1990s dealing with the collection of state sales taxes in the US. Up till now, goods purchased on-line, or by phone, from a retailer located in New York (Lee Valley for example) and shipped to a customer in (say) Florida have been sales tax free. No more.
I haven't read the ruling in detail, so can't advise if the sales tax will be collected on behalf of the sate where the sale takes place or the state where the goods are delivered.
This sales tax will apply to all US based retailers, so complexity wise, collecting Australian GST will not be a biggie.

Of note, the US Lie Nielsen website already contains a field for "tax" and if I order an item for delivery into Canada, the applicable provincial GST is added at checkout.


So maybe, the US Supreme Court has saved Gerry's bacon.

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me too!

Backflipped:
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-11-...pping/10520900

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Originally Posted by FenceFurniture

Backflipped:
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-11-...pping/10520900

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That's good news thank you Brett...
The Amazon USA website prices and range was always great especially on things that weren't available here.
Cheers, Peter

just a warning - they haven't backflipped completely, it's still only first party stocked product, not third party, so you don't have the full access (yet)

No, not completely. The shipping charges for the three remaining items in my cart was USD$59.

Seems they are making the shipping a *tad* more expensive.....

....

Overall Im not sure of anything any more. Amazon, after all, is just a reseller and logistics company. Admittedly they are doing an amazing job. I was on the lookout for some washing sauce for the new front loading washing machine (amazing!) and BigW are very competitive with their household products, especially bulk.

Makes me wonder what Woolworths et al are planning on the home-delivery-logistics front in the coming months. Being the "fresh food people" they still sell 90% of their products in cans and boxes. Being a store is convenient for eggs, but unnecessary for TP/powder/soap/cereal, etc, etc.....

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Originally Posted by woodPixel

No, not completely. The shipping charges for the three remaining items in my cart was USD$59.

Seems they are making the shipping a *tad* more expensive.....

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I signed up for prime before they stopped shipping to AU, as it offered free shipping, and despite the monthly charge, it ended up significantly cheaper, even when only ordering every three months or so. I wonder if this is still the same under the recent changes.

So what happens with the AU store? It is not going to get a lot of traction when you can still access the US site is it?

I suspect the deal internally is quite simple: any orders from the US are handled in AU (if have stock, ship from here), if not then do it internally.

However, I've been watching them closely and can guarantee its to disrupt the AU pricing downwards. Suppliers here have attempted to treat Amazon as simply a bulk merchant, such as they would MetCash. By "accepting defeat" and opening AU orders to the US site, this is a simple method to hammer/anvil blow local suppliers downwards.

Secondly, If you look around the site, you'll see huge price discrepancies between the AU site and US. This is due to the vast number of sellers simply using AU like eBay (i.e a sales front, or "logistics partner"). The manufacturers haven't jumped in (exceptions are J&J, Unilever, etc, which already bulk-ship direct to them).

This will destroy the perverse "businesses" that have sprung up selling OS stocks locally at ludicrous markups. These rent-seekers model is simple. They put an item on AU at 3X the cost, get their US cousin/sister/uncle to daily ship from the US and redirect/relabel when it arrives. This ticket-clipping type business is exactly what Amazon sought to destroy.... so hence the move.

The Amazon model is the oldest internet business there is: Disintermediation.

Now AU has all the local search stats for a full year, they will bulk import everything in the top 10% requests and let the ants fight over the profitless scraps.