In Reply to: Not Quite True posted by maverick on Thursday, 18. November 2004 at 15:58 Bali Time:
I would hate to "push my point" and appear to want to debate the whole essences of Australian tax law, but I think you will find that generally (with exceptions of course, none of which apply here)the taxman works on adding government excises and GST on purchases made in Australia. The Government simply cannot levy or tax goods that are purchased out of their jurisdiction, where another country has taxed the product in line with their own legislation. The standard souvenir buying holidaymaker buys a whatever it may be with AUD that they have already paid Australian income (PAYG) tax on; if the dollar is going overseas, income tax is the government's only concern. So as far as spending your hard earnt (taxed) ozzie dollars overseas, go for it regardless of what you buy (within reason some things MAY be acception) if the country you are visiting have taxed the product the Australian government can not and has never attempted to charge their GST, excises or any other type of sales tax.
The duty free limits are put on things like smokes and alcohol because these are the most popular purchases duty free and they work out a hell of a lot cheaper. Without limits, someone could go buy as many cartons and bottles as they could carry and make a profit on the fact they did not pay any taxes or excises at all and got them so cheap, basically on sell them in other words. One guy buys it "Duty free" and sells it on "tax free" the taxman misses out twice and his angry!, bingo! And then there where Duty Free limits for things that are traditionally easy to sell under the table. . Lets face it the limits aren't there because little Johnny is worried about our lungs and liver.
Buy what you want to buy on your oversea holiday and pay their tax and then don't stress about paying ours, oh yeah unless your a multi million dollar importer/exporter then you could have a whole different kettle of fish. As far as what is legal and illegal according to customs I'm not going to buy into like so many others I'm an accountant not a customs officer (or know-it-all.)SO after justifying my first answer with fact I hope Maverick now understands
Thanks