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Originally Posted by jak
I guess it is time for me to chime in here about Bratton's not shipping to Australia. This decision was made because the Australian government has started requiring US companies to register with their government and collect the duties and taxes for the orders before the order ships out. Than every month or so it would be up to Bratton's to file a return with the Australian government and submit the collected amount. If however the government feels there was an error, it would be up to Bratton's to pony up the money and if push come to shove the Australian government will get the US IRS involved. There was a certain dollar threshold that must be met for these rules to kick in, but we just don't have the manpower to monitor and comply with this ruling. That is why we have left the Australian market.
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That's a pretty accurate account of what has happened. It came about because some of our bricks and mortar retailers cried foul over no tax being charged on imports under $A1,000. The Govt figured that the cost of collecting the tax was more than the tax itself for amounts under $A1,000 - that would be $100 in GST. The retailers said the GST free goods were costing them sales so they got into the Government's ear and had things changed so that there is now no threshold. So that the cost of collecting the tax didn't cost the government, they made the vendors collect it for them. Cunning bastards but I very much doubt they ever even thought O/S suppliers might refuse to supply Australia. Another poorly considered Government decision!
On a similar and not unrelated issue, Amazon recently opened an Australian site and barred us from the US one. I suspect the change we have been talikng about was the reason. Well, Amazon has decided to allow us access to the US site again. I don't know whether they shut down the local site and I don't care because I will EVER shop Amazon again. I bought an item there a while ago and without my knowledge or consent, signed me up for Amazon Prime (or is it Amazon Premium?) and sarted taking money out of my bank account. I find that totally unacceptable and it has left me wary about buying on line from a foreign organisation.