From 1 July, Australian shoppers will only be able to purchase goods from Amazon’s Australian website to maintain compliance with new GST collection laws.
Under current legislation, a 10% per cent GST is applied to items bought overseas for more than $1,000. However, from the beginning of the new financial year, all online retailers must apply GST to all purchases made overseas and shipped to Australia, regardless of the price. People trying to reach Amazon’s US website will be redirected to the Australian site, which appears similar but offers a smaller range of products. Amazon has not disclosed which products available to Australian customers on its US website will no longer be accessible after the change.
Australian Treasurer, Scott Morrison, has been quoted as saying the new GST regulations will ‘level the playing field’ for Australian businesses. However, Amazon has expressed its intention to open a global store accessible to Australian customers, where products sold by Amazon US will be available. Details of how products would be shipped were not provided. ‘We have had to assess the workability of the legislation as a global business with multiple international sites’, a spokeswoman is quoted as saying.
Photo Review monitors the offshore prices of the equipment we review to inform our readers of what they can expect products to cost. In recent years, we have found local retail prices competitive with (and often cheaper than) those from a range of off-shore re-sellers, once shipping and other costs are taken into account.
