The Eurasian Economic Commission (the supranational regulator of the economic union of Belarus with Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Russia) is currently considering introducing an additional value added tax (VAT) for electronic marketplaces. If the amendments are approved, cross-border e-commerce will be subject to an additional 20% tax.
In the Ministry of Industry and Trade of Russia (Minpromtorg) to the Izvestia publication confirmedthat the draft amendments with changes to the Customs Code of the EAEU are already ready and are currently under discussion. According to the publication, the initiator of the introduction of the tax, which will affect, first of all, Chinese platforms for online trading, was Belarus and Kazakhstan. In these countries, a similar fee for goods from foreign online trading platforms has been in effect since 2022, however, they did not apply to the EAEU countries.
If such a tax is introduced in all EAEU countries, according to analysts of the popular Ozon marketplace, due to the rise in prices of foreign goods (mainly from China, which is not a member of the economic union), the cross-border trade market will decrease several times.
Representatives of another marketplace popular both in Russia and Belarus, Wildberries, sent an official letter to the Ministry of Industry and Trade, in which they expressed their concerns about the potential loss of a significant part of buyers after the introduction of a new tax.
The company emphasized that it is the absence of VAT on foreign goods that stimulates demand in the market and helps to saturate it with relatively inexpensive goods in the face of Western sanctions.
Recall that the other day, users of the Wildberries online store, popular in Belarus, noticed changes in the conditions of purchase. Money for the goods from buyers began to be written off immediately after placing the order, and not after after issuance. They explained this by the high workload of distribution points in the summer, which is why they do not have time to ship canceled goods.
In MART of Belarus, they explained that such a practice, when an online store requires a 100% prepayment for goods, is not a violation of the rights of buyers, from the point of view of Belarusian legislation.
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