Japanese shops applying Australian import tax

[cteno4]

Why are they just not doing this like a standard duty collection in Australia on all retail packages? Why only the larger revenue companies getting hit?Politicians trying to throw the collection over to the oversea company so they get more of the blame and not at home?

 

jeff

[Ochanomizu]

Hello,

 

AmiAmi is breaking Australian Taxation law.

 

Today I received this reply:

 

Quote

 

Hello.

 

Thank you for mailing us.

 

We are very sorry, but we do not have information regarding this "ABN".

 

If you have any questions, please let us know.

 

We apologize for the inconvenience.

Thank you for shopping at AmiAmi

 

Regards,

AmiAmi

 

 

Australian Tax law states that ANY business collecting GST for the Australian Taxation Office MUST be registered for GST with the Australian Government.

 

AmiAmi have not registered.

 

I have sent a reply to AmiAmi outlining their responsibilities.  I await their reply.

 

In the meantime, I would suggest Australians not pay the 10% until AmiAmi register for GST.

 

 

 

[Ochanomizu]

21 hours ago, cteno4 said:

Why are they just not doing this like a standard duty collection in Australia on all retail packages? Why only the larger revenue companies getting hit?Politicians trying to throw the collection over to the oversea company so they get more of the blame and not at home?

 

jeff

 

Hello,

 

In Australia, businesses with a turnover of less than $75k are not required to collect GST.  This is because the paperwork involved for small business is considered too demanding on a sole trader with such a small turnover.  So as to not discriminate against international companies, the same rule applies.  If a foreign company has a turnover of less than $75k in Australia they are not required to collect GST.

 

A company that registers for GST will have all product scanned when it lands in Australia.  The value of the goods is tallied against the ABN number for that business.  The ATO will then know roughly how much GST is to be paid by the company to the Australian Taxation Office.

 

If a business purchases products on which GST is charged and uses those products for business purposes that business can claim back the GST charged on the purchase.

 

AmiAmi is not playing by the rules.

[katoftw]

I just took my business elsewhere. 40,000 yen to MTP. 70,000 to HS.

Edited July 10, 2018 by katoftw

[Das Steinkopf]

1 hour ago, Ochanomizu said:

Hello,

 

AmiAmi is breaking Australian Taxation law.

 

Today I received this reply:

 

 

Australian Tax law states that ANY business collecting GST for the Australian Taxation Office MUST be registered for GST with the Australian Government.

 

AmiAmi have not registered.

 

I have sent a reply to AmiAmi outlining their responsibilities.  I await their reply.

 

In the meantime, I would suggest Australians not pay the 10% until AmiAmi register for GST.

 

 

 

 

 

I was reading through the ATO documentation and it mentions an ARN that overseas businesses can apply for and then they have a unique code that they use so the ATO can track how much they are liable for, I suspect however that they maybe exercising a rather cynical cash grab using the GST as an excuse. I have looked on a number of other forums and it's not just the railway modellers they have pissed off, there are plenty of figurine collectors as well as other modellers that are far from happy and if AmiAmi continues on the path they are on they will have expended their goodwill with their Australian customers and will lose a lot of business due to it.

[Das Steinkopf]

Okay so now it's my turn to be a pain in the arse, let's see what the response will be, mind you I have pretty much decided to take my business elesewhere once I have finalised all of the orders I have with them.

 

 

Hello AmiAmi

 Can you please give the details of your ABN or ARN as I did not see any details of it on my receipts, it is mandatory for all Australian businesses to display their ABN on receipts given to customers. 

 Also I would like to know if I am being charged the 8% Japanese Sales Tax with my orders, given my orders are for international shipping I believe that I should be exempt from paying the Japanese Sales Tax.

 

Edited July 10, 2018 by Das Steinkopf

[cteno4]

13 hours ago, Ochanomizu said:

 

Hello,

 

In Australia, businesses with a turnover of less than $75k are not required to collect GST.  This is because the paperwork involved for small business is considered too demanding on a sole trader with such a small turnover.  So as to not discriminate against international companies, the same rule applies.  If a foreign company has a turnover of less than $75k in Australia they are not required to collect GST.

 

A company that registers for GST will have all product scanned when it lands in Australia.  The value of the goods is tallied against the ABN number for that business.  The ATO will then know roughly how much GST is to be paid by the company to the Australian Taxation Office.

 

If a business purchases products on which GST is charged and uses those products for business purposes that business can claim back the GST charged on the purchase.

 

AmiAmi is not playing by the rules.

 

Ochanomizu,

 

I understand all this very well and read thru the aus ATO docs. My only curiosity was I t’s just an odd way to force a boarder duty. It’s penalizing the larger companies over the smaller ones. Usually tariffs are applied as customs duty on this sort of direct commerce, that way its applied evenly to all. Also strange making forgein companies follow Australian law and collect and send taxes to a forgein government. It feels like they want to just push the paperwork and political fall out offshore. Collecting duty the standard way at the post I think makes it all come down in country and thus blows back more on the politicians...

 

i have no no idea if amiami is properly registered or not. My suspicion is they were over the 75k threshold to register for an ABN but did not bother as probably not a lot of scrutiny on this in the past unless pretty big sales. But now I expect with having to collect the Australian gst they are scrambling to do the paperwork as now larger penalties are at stake and volume of business is being looked at closely now. Adding the appropriate paperwork with the sale will also require setting up and in my experience businesses usually procrastinate on this stuff and never realize all the details and issues that are going to pop up and the cost and blow back.

 

Das, 

 

as for the japan gst they never claim they are collecting it and have to collect it anyway by Japanese tax law, they are doing nothing illegal on this. Them being able to get back the funds tied up in Japan gst does not mean they have to give it to the customer. They do this in the final price they charge the customer — they are just building the price of doing export business into their price. They have to pay the japan gst when they buy stock and then also submit the balance of the gst for the final sale when they do an export order. They can at the end of they year do the paperwork to recover this. This is all a “Japanese” domestic thing and basically a cost of doing business for export of having to pay the japan gst and then have their money held and then do the bookkeeping and paperwork to get it back. Hs and amiami do it as just the 8% onto their Japanese price, about fair probably for overall export costs. Other shops just give a final price for export that includes these costs of doing business. All Japanese businesses are going to have to build this having to pay japan gst and get it back later into their price some where as it’s a basic cost of doing the export business. How much they charge is up to them and the customer then to decide if the final price is ok with them. 

 

When forginers buy stuff in person at stores in japan (if the store participated in this program) and do the paperwork there with passports they can get the gst not charged. It’s just the store being nice to bring in forgein business as they are only exempt on submitting the wholesale to retail but of gst but the gst the store paid on their whosale stock is already paid and they must wait to the end of the year and file the paperwork to get it back. Overall the store looses money over a tax refund sale over the same domestic sale. It’s a loss leader to attract forgeiners to the shop.

 

jeff

[chadbag]

Are you sure that they pay a consumption or sales tax on the stock they buy?   That would be a VAT way to do it, but the Japanese consumption tax is not a VAT.  In the US at least, when you buy stuff for re-sale, you do not pay any sales tax on t and do not have to claim it back at the end of the year.

 

[cteno4]

Yes it’s different with japan from most sales taxes here where the final retailer does the whole sales tax collection. The shop pays national sales tax on wholesale stock they buy, then they pay what ever is remaining on the final sale at the sale time. So they must cover the capital cost of the gst on the wholesale stock until they sell the piece and recover that from the customer. With potentially being a long time on some things and the cost of your operating capital it can add up. I don’t know ifnthe final bit of tax is collected monthly, quarterly, or annually. Knowing government agencies they usually want it sooner rather than later...

 

jeff

[katoftw]

Jeff. Do you have a financial interest in AmiAmi? You seem to be typing a lot of tl:dr posts defending AmiAmi's position on this.

 

Cant you accept that people may be frustrated that AmiAmi product is not 10-11% more costly now? That other retailers haven't made the change.

 

And just to let it slide and not attempt to education adults on how the world works and spins. Especially considering most info about AmiAmi is educated guesses anyway. And the people you are attempting to educate have actually done more legwork researching and emailing than yourself.

[chadbag]

 

Just some info:

 

Export sales do not collect Japanese GST.  When the sale is less than 200,000 yen the book keeping is not much at all.

 

http://www.customs.go.jp/english/c-answer_e/extsukan/5003_e.htm

 

 

General outline of how it works.   It sounds more like a VAT than a sales tax in general operation.

 

https://www.eu-japan.eu/taxes-accounting/consumption-taxes

 

I did not find anything on how often businesses have to "self assess" and make payments, but I suspect the bigger the business (activity), the more often they have to report and pay.   (In Utah I have to pay once a year since I hardly do any business -- other businesses have to report and pay quarterly or monthly -- and I would suspect something similar, as it means the taxman gets "his" faster that way)

[cteno4]

Sorry brain far there, yes on the export sale the shop does not have to pay the make up bit of tax between wholesale and retail price I think it’s just a paper wrightoff there when within limits. But they need to wait to get the gst paid on the wholesale stock back from the gov at the end of the year. The gst on the wholesale is paid to the wholesaler at the time of the order and thus out of pocket until the tax return following the sale.

 

again it’s all the businesses business on what they want to do about all this, all that matters is what price they ask for the item. None of the japan sellers I’ve ever used has shown an invoice with merchandise total and then japan gst applied. Just the price I paid for each item.

 

jeff

[chadbag]

25 minutes ago, cteno4 said:

Sorry brain far there, yes on the export sale the shop does not have to pay the make up bit of tax between wholesale and retail price I think it’s just a paper wrightoff there when within limits. But they need to wait to get the gst paid on the wholesale stock back from the gov at the end of the year. The gst on the wholesale is paid to the wholesaler at the time of the order and thus out of pocket until the tax return following the sale.

 

No, that is not how it works (per the descriptions given or other links I read).   They only pay the difference at the end, so they are not collecting anything back from the government (unless their export sales that are exempt dwarf their domestic sales and they don't collect enough to cover it)

 

Shop A buys 1M yen worth (wholesale) from KATO.  They pay the GST on that 1M yen.   They then sell that 1M yen worth for 2M yen.   They collect the GST on 2M yen.

 

They report it so:

 

bought 1M yen -- paid 8% == 80K yen

sold 2M yen -- collected 8% == 160K yen

 

When they file they write :  collected 160K - 80K paid = 80K due.

 

Now, with export, it would be something like the following

 

bought 1M yen -- paid 8% == 80K yen

sold 1.5M yen domestically -- collected 8% == 120K yen

sold 0.5M yen as export -- collected 0% = 0 yen

 

When they file, they write:  collected 120K - 80K paid = 40K due.

 

The difference is they have been collecting the 8% form their domestic sales all along and they get to equalize ALL their purchases with that and only have to pay the difference at the end.  So they are not out the whole export related GST they paid until the end of the year -- they are collecting it all along and equalizing their books all along the way.  (And if they only file yearly, they can use that GST they collected until they have to actually pay the difference.

 

One thing I read (which was a little old but I think that only affects the rates) said that businesses under a certain size (sales wise) collect the GST but they are exempt from paying the GST so at the end of the year they get to keep all the GST they collected, which is greater than what they paid on their inventory, since that difference is no longer due.

 

 

25 minutes ago, cteno4 said:

 

again it’s all the businesses business on what they want to do about all this, all that matters is what price they ask for the item. None of the japan sellers I’ve ever used has shown an invoice with merchandise total and then japan gst applied. Just the price I paid for each item.

 

jeff

 

[cteno4]

yes thats the book keeping. Essentially they are applying to get it back against the domestic gst they owe, same difference.

 

the issue is capital tied up waiting for gst refund on exports. on exports they pay the tax on the wholesale and then that is not returned to them until they file the next tax report. for the domestic sale the wholesale gst tax paid is essentially refunded to the shop at the time of sale if the shop. plus as you say the wholesale to retail gst they collect on gst is a float for them until return is filed and its not there on export sales as they dont collect it.

 

its the cost to the store is in tying up their gst paid for wholesale until the tax filing after the time of sale. exports naturally will be a bit more costly because of this. working capital always as a cost associated, interest if its gotten from loans or loss of appreciation if its from personal/business capital.

 

again its all moot as all that matters is what is the final price they are charging us. if they want to add margin for anything like waiting for export tax refund, its up to them. for amiami and hs you can just look at it as their discount is inflated by doing it from the srp plus the gst as they just treat the gst as domestic and then they dont have to deal with any of this essentially and they get an 8% back in the end to their margin minus whatever costs. this all is reflected in what overall discount they are giving. in the case of amiami its usually a larger discount with this 8% figured in to the "retail price" that its cheaper overall than other sellers. if we were to ask them to do it w/o the gst added to the srp to get the price to discount from they would just reduce the discount as in the end its what margin they can afford on the costs of doing an export sale. this would be the more direct way but does not work as well for marketing to show bigger discounts.

 

from the outside we only need to worry about who has the best end price to us if that is what folks are looking for and let each business worry about how they want to figure out that price. 

 

jeff

[chadbag]

24 minutes ago, cteno4 said:

yes thats the book keeping. Essentially they are applying to get it back against the domestic gst they owe, same difference.

 

the issue is capital tied up waiting for gst refund on exports. on exports they pay the tax on the wholesale and then that is not returned to them until they file the next tax report. for the domestic sale the wholesale gst tax paid is essentially refunded to the shop at the time of sale if the shop. plus as you say the wholesale to retail gst they collect on gst is a float for them until return is filed and its not there on export sales as they dont collect it.

 

 

No.  They do not get it back when they file.   They get it back as they make domestic sales.  So unless they do no domestic sales until the last day of their tax period, they are not waiting until the end of the tax period to get the money back.

 

Let's assume that they pay yearly and that their sales are pretty even across the whole year -- assume they sell the same amount every month or quarter (both domestically and export)

 

They buy 1M yen (we'll calculate up front and buying equal amounts each quarter) and pay 80K in GST up front.   They sell 1.5M yen domestically and 0.5M yen export in the year so they collect 120K in tax and at the end of the tax year have to remit 40K to the authorities.  (Assuming a 100% markup, which is probably reasonable for specialty retail [note this is not margin but gross income]).

 

(Use 1M is only about 10K in USD -- not a lot of sale -- it just makes the math easy to understand -- say they do 100x or 1000x that -- multiply the numbers below by 100 or 1000)

 

1st Quarter -- they sell 375K domestically and collect 30K in tax.  They sell 125k in export and collect no tax.  

 

If they bought all 1M up front, then at the end of the quarter, that 30K in tax is theirs since they paid 80K in tax already.   So they only have 50K sunk in "tax investment".

If they buy 250M per quarter, they only paid 20K in tax on that, and collected 30k tax, so they have 10K tax to save for the end of the year and have already gotten ALL of their tax investment back.

 

2nd quarter -- they sell 375k domestically and collect 30k in tax.  They sell 125k in export and collect no tax.

 

If they bought all 1M up front, they have collected another 30K, which is all theirs, as their total tax collected is 60K vs 80k paid.   So in 6 months they have 3/4 of their "sunk tax investment" back.

 

If they buy quarterly, they again have gotten all their tax back and have 10K they need to save for their end of year tax payment.

 

3rd quarter -- they sell 375k domestically and collect 30K, of which 20K is all theirs, and they have now gotten ALL of their initial 80K back, and they have 10K for the tax man at the end of the year.  So it took less than 3/4 of the year to get their money back.   And most businesses do not front load inventory like this so this is really a sort of "worst case" that assumes they only turn their inventory over once a year.

 

If they buy quarterly, again the same numbers above and they have fully gotten their money back they paid on the inventory and have money bank for the tax man.

 

4th quarter -- same sales -- this time they have 30K for the tax man on the 1M up front and again they get their money back and 10K for the tax man when buying quarterly.

 

In real life, a business will turn their inventory over more than once a year, and not buy it all up front.   So their actual time they have "lost / sunk" tax costs burdening them will be quite short.

 

So there is no huge burden, shown by the math, for companies that pay the tax on the wholesale cost and export some of that and collect no tax since they do NOT wait until the end of the year to get that money back.  They get it back as they make domestic sales and are collecting more per sale than they paid out for the sold merchandise.  And they are turning their inventory multiple times throughout the year.

 

I am sure it is more complicated than this (what happens when they close out merchandise at less than they paid?  Can they claim that tax back etc?   But the general overall picture above shows how it works).

 

My whole point is that they are NOT sunk on that tax cost for the whole year or until the end of the year -- they are only sunk on that cost for as long as it takes them to make it up domestically.   Now, if their major business is export and they do only a small amount of domestic, I don't know how it works out.  I assume there are provisions also that make it so that if they ONLY export stuff, that they don't have to wait until the end of the year to get that back, but I don't know the details.

 

NOW, I agree that for me, it does not really matter how they work it.   What matters to me is how much they charge me (or really, what my overall cost will be in the end).   How they work out the price is their business (I agree with you on that).

 

If AmiAmi charges me less than someone else, no matter how they are dealing with GST etc., than I am more likely to buy from them, ignoring factors that may influence that like overall customer service, etc.  (I might be willing to pay more for a company that provides good service over a company that charges less but sucks at service).  For our Australian friends, they need to work out the details of what is required of them and what their overall cost is (for example, from those companies that are NOT taking the tax out -- they probably have to fork it over when it comes in to the country -- I don't know how it works with this new tax regime -- ie, AmiAmi, who seems to not be registered, takes the tax, but since they are not registered, the recipient gets charged again when it comes in to the country since there is no registration number to credit the sale to and expect the tax from vs HS or MTP who may not be registered, but are not taking the tax and the recipient has to pay it on entry to the country, but the vendor did not take it up front vs one who did and is not registered, so the recipient has to pay 2x???  )

 

Edited July 10, 2018 by chadbag

[cteno4]

you are robbing domestic to pay export some there. domestic sales will help but not make it go away.

 

Yes i agree its not the whole year and will depend on the frequency of wholesale and inventory turnover. but compare it to all domestic sales and you will see that export does cause a backlog in there and it will always do this as they need to wait to wholesale gst to be refunded in stead at time of purchase by domestic. from what i was told the gst refund for exports comes at the end of the year, not quarterly.

 

compare to all domestic sales in the same situation.

 

Q1 500k sales 40K tax taken in so half of wholesale tax money is reimbursed 40K in inventory tax burden

 

Q2 500k sales 40K tax taken in now all wholesale tax is reimbursed no inventory tax burden

 

Q3 500k sales 40K now in the bank for taxes at end of year

 

Q4 500k sales 80k now in bank to pay off tax man.

 

jeff

[Das Steinkopf]

So in a nutshell AmiAmi has been collecting the 8% GST off foreign buyers as a way of subsidising their discounts, for foreign buyers their so called discount is less than stated due to the GST being applied to their orders. If a company in Australia did the same thing the ACCC would mount legal action against that company and fine them quite a hefty sum for misleading their customers.

 

Most Australian customers shopped there due to the “discount” prices they have and a lot would not have worried about the 8% Sales Tax, however when they decided to start charging the 10% GST as well without any mechanism to pay the ATO it’s a pure rort. This not just a case of smelling a rat, it’s a case of where he is sitting in plain sight feasting away on a nice big fat chunk of cheese, if AmiAmi is content with ripping Australian customers off then they will be more than happy  to lose a couple of million dolars in sales, there are plenty of people in various hobbies that use them, not just railway modellers.

Edited July 11, 2018 by Das Steinkopf

[chadbag]

5 minutes ago, cteno4 said:

you are robbing peter to pay paul some there. domestic sales will help but not make it go away.

 

What do you mean?  The way I outlined it is exactly how it works based on the links I posted and other similar links, including ones from the Japanese finance ministry websites (the ones dealing with tax)

 

5 minutes ago, cteno4 said:

 

Yes i agree its not the whole year and will depend on the frequency of wholesale and inventory turnover. but compare it to all domestic sales and you will see that export does cause a backlog in there and it will always do this as they need to wait to wholesale gst to be refunded in stead at time of purchase by domestic. from what i was told the gst refund for exports comes at the end of the year, not quarterly.

 

There is no refund for exports, unless maybe your exports are such a large percentage, that your wholesale "gst cost" is not made up for in domestic sales.   You take in GST from domestic sales and use it to offset your wholesale costs for GST.   If you happen to have export sales, you take in GST at a slower pace than if everything is domestic.

 

NOW, there is probably year end (or tax period end) EXPORT related filing and reporting to do, but you have already gotten your money back through your GST intake.

 

The way Japanese GST works is you basically remit the difference from what you pay and what you take in.   There is no special treatment for GST you paid out where the products get exported (except for reporting purposes and maybe if your exports are so large you need to get something back when your domestic does not make up for it)

 

5 minutes ago, cteno4 said:

 

compare to all domestic sales in the same situation.

 

Q1 500k sales 40K tax taken in so half of wholesale tax money is reimbursed 40K in inventory tax burden

 

Q2 500k sales 40K tax taken in now all wholesale tax is reimbursed no inventory tax burden

 

Q3 500k sales 40K now in the bank for taxes at end of year

 

Q4 500k sales 80k now in bank to pay off tax man.

 

jeff

 

Yes, if you had no export sales it would look like that.  With export sales, it looks basically the same but it takes a little longer to catch up with what you paid (if you buy all inventory up front) since you are not taking in GST with export sales.  But you are also not waiting until year end to file and get a refund on that GST you paid wholesale that was exported at retail.

[cteno4]

5 hours ago, katoftw said:

Jeff. Do you have a financial interest in AmiAmi? You seem to be typing a lot of tl:dr posts defending AmiAmi's position on this.

 

Cant you accept that people may be frustrated that AmiAmi product is not 10-11% more costly now? That other retailers haven't made the change.

 

And just to let it slide and not attempt to education adults on how the world works and spins. Especially considering most info about AmiAmi is educated guesses anyway. And the people you are attempting to educate have actually done more legwork researching and emailing than yourself.

 

no i dont, what my point has been on the Japanese gst it is their business, not ours at all. we cant say you cant charge us extra here for an export. AFAIK there is no law in japan that says they have to sell export at domestic price. its all a smoke and mirrors on the marketing discount price as Das said and over all amiami was one of the deepest final discounts. trying to demand some or all of the japanese gst on export sales back is just not going to work. if they do that they will just drop the discount. this part is the same for everyone around the world. exports add some extra hassles onto their business and thus some costs. but again all moot as all that matters was the final price to you and usually amiami was among the best, so thats why i was trying to defend them that you cant demand they give you 8% back for gst on an export.

 

on the Aus gst i was just curious why they were trying to do this offshore recovery from larger companies but it seemed like not recovering it as customs duty for the smaller shops. usually like the EU this is done as customs duty on everything to make it uniform, but it looks like the government does not want to deal with collecting it with the post (new system to set up) with this so just forcing the big guys to do it. We have the same issue brewing here with all the different sales taxes of states and municipalities in the US and recent court rulings that sellers can be forced to collect these for any state if they want it. Going to be a nightmare of bookkeeping with 50 different states!

 

you are totally right if amiami does not have their paperwork in order for collecting aus gst they are in big trouble and wrong. you are correct we are all assuming at this point if they have their paperwork in order or not for their ABN with ATO. we shall see if they are following the rules or not. its a messy way to try to collect from other countries. When things like this change its always going to be a mess and businesses will react differently, some just doing wait and see, some just misunderstanding, some ignorant, and some will of course take advantage illegally if they think they can. we have yet to see which is the case with amiami

 

im out of it.

 

jeff

[chadbag]

21 hours ago, Ochanomizu said:

Hello,

 

AmiAmi is breaking Australian Taxation law.

 

 

I should point out that AmiAmi has, as far as I know, no domicile in Australia.  They are not subject to Australian Taxation law, not being an Australian company or registered foreign company (like you would do if you had a local office), with no office or presence in Australia.

 

If Australians won't to transact business with AmiAmi, it is up to Australia to set the laws for that to happen.  But you cannot pass laws in one country that affect other countries unless they they have some sort of connection.    You can put inducements in for them to comply, and put up barriers for their direct entry into the market if they don't, but you cannot force them to comply until they become subject to Australian law.  Now, if Australia wants to intercept packages from AmiAmi (or any other foreign company) and charge extra duties or tax or whatever, above and beyond what would otherwise be collected, or otherwise make the AmiAmi-- Australian customer relationship more painful than it has to be, that would be a major inducement for AmiAmi (or MTP or HS or anyone) to play ball.

 

But AmiAmi cannot break a law they are not subject to.    Australia can of course do its best to stop Australians from doing business with them if they don't comply by intercepting packages, etc.

[Das Steinkopf]

The issue is that they have put a disclaimer on their website stating that in compliance with 

recent changes they will be collecting the 10% GST, if this is not being passed onto the ATO it’s a clear cut case of fraud. When it comes to the crunch the ATO has no mandate to force it’s legislation onto businesses in a foreign jurisdiction, they could however make it difficult for them by either having websites blocked or make it painful through Customs for items that they have shipped to be delayed etc which would discourage people from buying from those companies.

[JR 500系]

It's a huge bummer that our friends in Australia is hit with the 10% tax... which like many others have mentioned, shouldn't be levied on in the first place. 10% is quite a lot, but why was it also levied on shipping costs too? It seems like the prices are 10% + total cost of items with shipping costs...

 

This episode has sort of wavered my trust in Ami, which I am a long time customer of.... Having said that, even if they did levied the Japanese tax on the RSP which they actually shouldn't for exports (not sure of this rule here), for myself, if the end selling price is still lower than other online retailers, I will still consider them. They also have a points system which is useful when accumulated to defray shipping costs... 

[katoftw]

Just got my first payment request from them. They only applied the gst to the stock. Not the shipping.

[Das Steinkopf]

4 minutes ago, katoftw said:

Just got my first payment request from them. They only applied the gst to the stock. Not the shipping.

 

 

Hobbysearch?

[chadbag]

I would definitely ask AmiAmi for whatever registration number or info they should have for being part of the system before I paid them anything.  (If needs be, ship to friends in US and have them forward to you -- there will be no tax or customs on the incoming to the US in my experience).  I would not pay them the 10% if they were not properly registered as there is a chance you would have to pay again when it gets into the country as there would be no record they were properly registered and collecting the money.