Sales Tax On Stamps

This is a sour topic to me.

Another member in here asked if we paid the same tax if we bought from another philatelic agency? In my personal experience, "YES". I ordered stamps with a marine (fish, sealife etc) theme for my wife's collection from Australia and I had to pay the blasted VAT tax over there. Like I was thinking at the time, it is bad enough that I have to pay HST on my own Canadian stamps, but it is adding insult to injury that I had to pay the Australian tax as well. No offence to our Australian members in here but I am against a lot of the government tax policies,from here as well.

To the best of my knowledge, we are (or were??) the only to have a sales tax on our postage stamps.

Chimo

Bujutsu

I Got the tax regulation from Canada Post's Website:

http://www.canadapost.ca/cpo/mc/per...llection.jsf




So if you buy a booklet of 10 stamps to mail Christmas cards to the US, and bring them home, stick them on the envelopes and mail them, you pay tax.

If you bring the cards into the post office and buy the stamps and stick them on there, no tax.

Ridiculous!

Bujutsu, there was a comment somewhere from an Australian who said there was tax on Australian domestic mail, but I can't find it.

Edit: I found the thread - it is confusing in Australia too!

https://goscf.com/t/8158#8158

Having gone through the detailed regulations related to HSt for my not-for-profit organization, I quickly came to realize the key to understanding its many complexities.

The HST regime seems to meander because it is all about where the good or service benefits the purchaser. If my org sells a product to someone in Ontario, we charge 13% on the retail value. If we sell to someone in British Columbia, we need to charge 12% on the retail value. And on it goes, for each and every tax regime across the country. It's a ton of extra admin work for the seller.

It's the same for memberships in organizations. Very convoluted, and in some cases explains why some philatelic societies have gone to great lengths to show how taxes apply to their membership dues depending on where the member lives.

Taxes. A growth industry if ever there was one!

Peter

Thanks all for your feedback

Like any government, there is so much 'red tape'. They are incapable of making things simple - they cannot do it - simple as that.

Since I got nicked for Australian VAT costs, I have since tried to get a collector friend just buy it for me and we make arrangements from there. See, two collectors, simple procedure

I am also having problems understanding the HST re metered mail. If I go to the PO here in town, whether I buy stamps or meters, I still get nicked the HST.

Chimo

Bujutsu

When you buy them as a stamp to collect you are paying tax on a product.

When you buy them for something you are mailing at that moment you are paying the tax on a service and not so much the product. a bit of both perhaps, as the stamp or meter itself does not cost that much to make.

When you pay me you are buying me a cup of coffee.

Let me get this straight. If I as a citizen of the US order Canadian stamps from the Canadian philatelic source, I do not have to pay the GST? Do I have to pay shipping? Someone I think said no shipping charge, but that does not seem probable.

If I do not have to pay shipping or GST, it seems that a little larceny would be possible. With me ordering and then sending to folks in Canada and them paying me the actual cost to me of the stamps.

To answer the original question, I do not pay sales tax on stamps I buy from the post office.

No tax on stamps in the UK.

To wax pontifical on a topic I know nothing about: I would think it to utterly behoove a country with a non-privatized postal service to make its products cheap for foreigners: no sales tax, no VAT, no postage. Theoretically foreigners are paying maybe 1% for the printed product and the rest as prepayment of services that they will never cash in.

it seems that a little larceny would be possible. With me ordering and then sending to folks in Canada and them paying me the actual cost to me of the stamps.

Except for that, of course. :^)

In the U.S., there is no interstate sales tax. Within some states there is no sales tax (when I was in Vermont and needed a new computer right away, and didn't have time to wait for Amazon, I decided it was worth the $80 discount to drive into New Hampshire to buy it.) And I've known Canadians to drive across the border, buy new clothes, and wear them home. Surely someone near a state border is ordering products from his own state, having them shipped across to someone in the next state, and driving them back? Whenever a system can be gamed like that, it suggests to me that some overall revision needs to take place.

Another thing about GST in Australia.
A business has to earn over $75,000 before you have to pay GST on what you sell.
I am not going to open this can of worms up any more.
It just gets so complex. KGV

rohumpy: As of the early 2000's when I last ordered from the Canadian Philatelic Centre, I did not pay GST nor any shipping. From the regulations posted above by another, there is still no GST for foreigners buying Canadian stamps outside of Canada. I was ordering items like the Millennium book and year sets too - no tax. I haven't heard of anyone starting a bootlegging operation for stamps yet.

Correct Battlestamps. There is no tax on orders from outside of Canada. There is a fixed handling charge of $2.00 for phone orders (no matter how large or small the order), but no charge for internet orders.

I was wondering if the USA or other countries had a Federal tax that was hidden away and included in the price paid by the consumer?

Canada used to have the Federal portion of the tax hidden away years ago so all you saw as a consumer was the Provincial portion, and yes, some did cross provincial borders to avoid paying their own province's sales tax. New Brunswick / Nova Scotia was a big thing.

Thanks for the feedback. So it looks as though Canada is the only
country that charges sales tax on stamps purchased at the PO.






Good observation rohumpy. Who knows maybe it's already being done.

It is my understanding that Australia DOES charge GST, but they include the GST in the face value of the stamp - an OZ member maybe can elaborate on this?