Aliexpress collecting tax now?

I for one, don’t carry a grudge towards AE. Their prices and wide selection offsets any small additional cost. They have just so recently made some changes to the login and is better. This was a more contentious item than a 5 to 10 % price hike as I’ve had with FTs web page price vs. cart. And so recently, Ali Express Shipping is using Hong Kong Air Hub which makes for much better transit times - 10 to 16 days which was 3 to 5 weeks. Compared to FastTech’s PostNL which takes 8+ weeks.

Whether or not AliExpress hands over the "tax money," I will continue shopping there.

I will shop at almost anywhere (that is reputable) if they have the lowest price or offer something I cannot get elsewhere.

Copy and pasted (probably from a US site) and edited to show (add) states that do NOT require interstate withholdings (like Kansas). Again… tax rate is ALSO incorrect. They are just slapping one rate across the board and loading the Brinks truck up with succa’ money daily.

I hold a “grudge” against liars and if US buyers stopped buying from these liars (maybe they’d drop the fake tax game pretty quick).

BUT… to each their own and I just can NOT smell a rat- when I smell one :expressionless:

They are showing the correct sales tax rate for Pa. on my receipt.

I don’t disagree with you on grudges. However, I can assure you based on the Aliexpress notice: “According to the law of American states, for orders shipped to below states are subject to sales tax, including states tax and country/city sales tax. Aliexpress is required by law to collect sates tax and remit to these the relevant local tax authories. The states which are required by law to collect states tax include (updating) : Washington state— From 1 October 2018” that if they are collecting Washington state tax but not remitting it to Washington State, those state officials would grab those small Ali testicles and you would be able to hear the screaming, squealing and wailing as far away as Kansas.

No jurisdiction… there’s not a state in the US that’s going to do anything to anybody in China. And I’ll say it again… If Kansas does not have to have taxes remitted by resellers in the US, how would Chinese resellers have any impetus to do so? Add to that, many resellers out of China do not collect taxes for sales and there’s a reason for that. :stuck_out_tongue:

Right now there will possible be a transition period (1 year?) for them to put the system in place.

From the list: Alabama, Oklahoma, Kansas— From 1 Dec 2019
Maybe you can check your state’s requirement.

Edit: found this

??

https://www.salestaxcolorado.com/foreign-companies-doing-business-in-the-united-states/

The above doesn’t apply to international sellers selling into Kansas, just other states.

Once again, today I don’t get ANY sales tax assessed by Amazon, EBay, Etc. or any major sellers here IN THE US when whatever I’m buying is shipped to Kansas.

AX isn’t a reseller in a state, they have no authority to tax outside of China, and nobody is making them collect taxes on exported products to the US. They ELECT to collect them… right into their bank (and a scam is a scam).

The FIRST sentence of the article above…

“Any presence in the United States such as subsidiaries, assets or sending individuals, etc. can trigger sufficient nexus with one or more of the 50 states and in some local jurisdictions.”

AliExpress has no “presence” in the United States… they again can’t establish a nexus if they don’t technically exist IN THE USA as a reseller.

Thus, as I’ve said many times on this post… they are charging a FAKE TAX!

The case was South Dakota vs. Wayfair, which changed the standard from a physical nexus (Quill vs. North Dakota), to an economic nexus.

Don’t blame Colorado, blame one of the Dakotas. :smiley:

In lieu of some Federal guideline, what the Wayfair case did was to clear the way for each state to individually decide whether to collect sales taxes from online sales, and under which conditions those collections would be triggered. For some, that includes international sales.

It took some time for states to draw up and enact those statues, and their effective dates, so it has taken some time for adoption of collection policies to occur, also depending on trigger thresholds being reached.

Alibaba shares are sold on the NYSE (BABA), and it is required to submit filings with the SEC, using Form 6-K as a cover to the financial reports it files at home. Because it is listed, it must also file annual reports using Form 20-K. That’s called reporting.

You can even work for Alibaba in the U.S. There are currently openings in California and NY.

The company that owns AX is a multi-national conglomerate with a presence in the U.S., not just some dude peddling cheap Chinese junk from a booth at a night market in Asia (as fabulous as those are), with an online storefront on the side.

Those are the facts. Beating the dead horse of the he said/she said/they do/they don’t accomplishes nothing without any proof from either side.

It’s a fair question to ask, but if states like California and NY, which have never met a tax they don’t like, aren’t complaining, they either means they’re happy with the new revenue stream, or asleep at the wheel. Maybe both.

Bottom line, AX collects sales taxes. Buy from it, or don’t.

I am not a tax guy at all, don’t know too much of it.
But Alibaba Holdings do have a registered address (a real company location, actually) in the US:

U.S. Office:

400 South El Camino Real
Suite 400
San Mateo, CA 94402
United States
Tel: (+1) 1-408-785-5580
Fax: (+1) 1-408-748-1218

So maybe someone could simply contact the US head office and ask for clarification. This address might (!) also be the reason why they have to collect taxes in the US? We only pay the funds, we don’t see how the funds flow on their end. At these amounts of goods sold each country will be eager to get a chunk of the profits.

Always wondered why I have to turn off my VPN when going to Sofirn.com . Now I think I know:

While it’s unclear what the consequences of non-compliance might look like in each country, in general, tax departments don’t muck around. Just as an example, New Zealand consumers can now be automatically fined up to $25,000 for using VPNs to try and hide their true location to avoid GST. What might the penalty then be for businesses who don’t file taxes

Zappaman, you got me looking at this in greater detail than I care but from what I am seeing in my searches is that any company meeting your state’s sales tax nexus must collect sales tax including international companies. I think some companies are still flying under the radar. The burden these companies are under to figure out all the different rates and laws around the world must be tremendous.

This is a pretty informative article : U.S. Sales Tax Explained for both U.S. and Non-U.S. Sellers | Perpetua

Again, you piqued my interest, not trying to start an argument. I think we are going to see this from all sellers as the states start to enforce the rules. It is all relatively new.

State governments are terrible at enforcement . It will probably take a company to turn a competitor in before they catch those not complying.

New Zealand brought that in Dec last year for any overseas business selling over 60K in sales annually. Our tax is 15% which is way too high. I didn’t really care about taxes up until I started my own business, now it’s very difficult with all the different taxes

It is very hard to be a profitable small business today. All the fees, licenses, taxes, insurances, mandates, regulations cut into profits. I told all my kids to go to college and get a job with benefits.

Just bought something on AliExpress, and they have a new text block in their “payment verified email”:

They didn’t have this a short while ago.

edit: forgot to mention - I wasn’t charged any additional sales tax. Product price = paid price. Goods are going to a family member in Switzerland.

No tax over at BG. I was surprised recently when i saw I was charging tax … for ebay :open_mouth:

I stand corrected on agency (nexus) in the USA… and thus: assert that this is WHY AE should NOT be withholding sales tax in Kansas (today).

Just ordered a solar charger from Amazon- no sales tax (as always). I can’t believe Bezos isn’t on top of tax laws in the US 50 states.

Proof is in the market, and the market in Kansas says, “NO taxes withheld!” (yet) :wink:

- this is enough proof to me that AX is charging a fake tax. All else is rhetoric which can be argued til the cow comes home :smiley: