Good news for Ebay Sellers? Amazon to block its US website for Aussies

[the_2nd_zoo]

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2018/may/31/amazon-to-block-australians-from-using-us-sto...

[countessalmirena]

Pennyforum, if geolocation is detected in spite of any efforts to disguise it, then perhaps the Buy For Me option is still in play. (Comgateway is an example.)

[countessalmirena]

The Australian site has nothing on it that I'm interested in purchasing. (Or if they have good items, they're far, far more expensive than on the US site.)

[davidc4430]

this is a bit similar to the dvd region codes, where we were made to buy australian coded dvds and an australian coded player to play them on until the govt was forced to step in and make companys make dvd players region free.

i'm not sure what the situation is with dvds now, my player is region free and plays anything from any where.

i dont know if i buy a new dvd player will it play everything.

seems govts or companys are constantly trying to control us.

[brerrabbit585]

Amazon also has no problem collecting VAT for digital items that are bought by Europeans, and there are something like 28 different levels of VAT for different countries within the EU. If they can add tax on for the US states and for Europe, what's the big deal about adding it for Australia?

I've never used Amazon as I could never figure out how the postage worked!

[dazzledayz]

That's the thing isn't it; Amazon could do it easily but choose not to.

Probably drawing a line in the sand seeing as globally moves are underway to bring the big multinats in from the tax-free cold.

There's no real way geo-blocking can work in the modern world of proxies, vpn's, on-forwarders, buying services et al.

The crazy thing is that Amazon is already paying gst on its Aussie operational turnover, just like eBay.au.

This looks more like a dummy spit than anything else.

The Aussie Feds may also get a bit of a surprise at the sudden uptick in O/S "gift" parcels on which no gst is payable.

[digital*ghost]

They have the technology to do it, but not the motivation. I'm guessing they are taking the opportunity to prop the AU site, though they would have to be monumentally ignorant of the reasons Aussies shop on other sites to believe it will have a significant effect on sales there, IMO. 

Still, the difference with the EU's VAT on digital items, is that there's no entity the buyer is dealing with aside from the vendor, so no one else to foist the responsibility of collection on to and therefore no real room to protest the imposition. Plus, I believe both the EU VAT and sales tax being collected from buyers in certain US states, is 100% indiscriminate, while the GST is not (i.e. the tax is applied to all sales, no matter what, while the GST is only meant to be applied to businesses who have an Australian turnover of $75k or more. I also think that the government deciding sites like eBay and Amazon are the businesses - purely for the purposes of GST on the products listed there - is sketchy at best, maybe a little less so for Amazon, who do have their own stock), so I suspect the protest may also be because Amazon might think there's still room to move, or negotiate (plus, public pressure [if they can get some on their side] often accumulates best when people are faced with the realities of things, rather than the possibility). 

I'm guessing this has put a 30-day clock on a few Aussie businesses, though. 

[dazzledayz]

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@digital*ghost wrote:

I'm guessing they are taking the opportunity to prop the AU site. 

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It wouldn't surprise me at all if this was a move to push a few US sellers to the AU site which has been slow to build.

More store fees, more sellers, more products more win win flow for the big river.

[davidc4430]

i think i heard old harvey norman on radio this morning (it may have been another HN clone tho, i was half asleep) bleating how companys like Amazon had been getting away with "all this for too long"

but hang on, the likes of Amazon have only existed since the internet as a selling tool became 'the future'

before that companys like Harvey Norman had the fielf to themselves with the slogan "You Want It, You Have To Buy It From Us At Our Prices!"

very little competition to drive prices down.

oh, and it was OK for mr Harvey to build one of his Mega Stores near a 'little guy' company, take his customers and put him out of bussiness!

how many mum and dad stores went out of bussiness when mr Norman rolled into town?

so now to save mr Normans bussiness we all have to stop shopping at a bussiness who is bigger then him!

sound fair.

[digital*ghost]

Wait a minute... That just made me realise international sellers on the AU site would have to have GST applied to their sales, like they do on eBay, surely. I know there are a lot of OS sellers on there already, as there was practically nothing in my own categories being listed by AU sellers when I checked it, so they must be ok with (and have a system for) collecting GST in those cases. 

[dazzledayz]

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@digital*ghost wrote:
I believe both the EU VAT and sales tax being collected from buyers in certain US states, is 100% indiscriminate, while the GST is not (i.e. the tax is applied to all sales, no matter what, while the GST is only meant to be applied to businesses who have an Australian turnover of $75k or more.

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I'd say that the govt's approach is well and truly indiscriminate.

@Anything bought O/S will now be taxed @10%.

As business sellers in Aus nothing really changes for us though.

A gst registered AU business buying O/S will claim the gst component back via BAS just like they do now.

Small businesses <$75k will just subtract the total cost of goods on an annual basis, again, just as they do now.

No real change at all other than a 10% initial impost at point of purchase, just as there is now (for local goods purchased).

I was initially worried the feds would do something really stupid like make tax payments collectable at PO's or somesuch.

In some ways I think this is not a bad move as it goes some way towards forcing the tax issue with multi-nats.