'Customs vague on implementation' claim
Published on: Saturday, September 02, 2017
Kota Kinabalu: Some backpacker lodging operators in Sabah and Labuan F.T. are frustrated over what they claim to be failure by Customs to provide definitive answers to certain questions on the Tourism Tax 2017 that came into effect Sept. 1, this year. It followed a Customs briefing for them at Wisma Wanita, here, last week, and according to the operators and managers, the four personnel from Customs HQ Kuala Lumpur appeared clueless on aspects relating to the implementation of the tax. This includes questions on rooms with two, four or more beds and whether the RM10 per room per night should be charged proportionately if more than one foreigner occupies the room among the number of Malaysian and foreign tourists occupying it.
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The situation is compounded by a loophole as a Malaysian visitor to Sabah may bring his foreign friends to stay in the same room registered under the Malaysian's name, whereby the tourists need not pay the tax. Furthermore, foreigners with documents showing they are on approved work expedition need not pay tourism tax staying in backpacker lodges or hotels.They also questioned why the media was not invited or allowed to attend the session. During the meeting, some of the attendees at the back booed the briefing officers due to their inability to provide definitive answers.
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The Tourism Tax is to be collected from registered accommodation providers other than listed village homestay. All the operators present had accommodation business of more than five rooms, selling bed space rather than rooms for economy price sensitive budget tourists, many of whom stay longer to explore Sabah and Labuan.
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They questioned why the Sabah Government and the relevant Ministry failed to persuade the Ministry of Tourism & Culture Malaysia to defer the implementation to next year , calling on the Minister to fulfil his promise of one third allocation each to both states. A backpacker hostel operator, Johnny Wong, said: "Some foreign bookings were cancelled when my office informed them of the RM10 fee which was not notified to them in advance due to the haste of implementation and the uncertainty of the effective policy date with the state authority trying to defer the matter. "Sarawak I can understand as the State Minister comes from a different party."Roger Lee, another operator interjected, "They from Sarawak are also in the same BN-lah."These operators felt being exploited by the Customs and the Ministry of Tourism and Culture as they are subjected to very stiff penalties if they failed to do so."Do you know that under the Tourism Tax Act 2017 effective first of September 2017, under Section 10 subsection 3 provides that any operator like us who contravenes subsection 1 commits an offence and shall, on conviction, be liable to a fine not exceeding 30,000 ringgit or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding one year or both."Who'd imagine starting a business like this puts you in risk of imprisonment and fine when it is supposed the responsibility of those who wanted the tax to collect it, not us," said Pencey Liow, adding that she is open to takeover by interested investors.Asked on subsection 1, she read from her copy, "every operator shall be liable to be registered under this Act, and for such purpose shall apply to the Director-General to be registered, in the manner as may be prescribed.""That's a joke, as they have already registered us without our knowledge beforehand. You know what we were taken aback at the session when the Director-General of the Customs suddenly told us that he had to leave early to catch his flight back to KL before we could ask him any question, and the retiring Sabah Customs head also left the meeting much earlier after just a brief appearance," said Lucy Ho, managing a hostel.Stay up-to-date by following Daily Express’s Telegram channel.
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