World News | Apple’s Japanese unit hit with $105M tax bill for bulk iPhone sales to tourists

Tokyo [Japan]Dec 28 (ANI): The Tokyo subsidiary of US tech giant Apple has been slapped with a $105 million (14 billion yen) fine for bulk duty-free sales of iPhone smartphones and other Apple devices to foreign tourists, Kyodo News reported. additional tax.

Citing people familiar with the matter, Kyodo News reported that the Tokyo Local Taxation Bureau found that Apple Japan’s tax-free sales of approximately US$104,168,400 (140 billion yen) in the two years to September 2021 were made by fraudulent duty-free shops for commercial purposes. Purchases for resale.

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The tax agency, which began investigating last year, uncovered a number of unusual transactions, including a tourist who bought hundreds of devices at an Apple store, the Japan News Service reported.

An additional tax of US$105 million (14 billion yen) is believed to be levied on underreported sales, which is believed to be the highest additional consumption tax on duty-free sales on record, according to news reports.

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Only foreign tourists who buy souvenirs or daily necessities and take them abroad within six months of arriving in Japan can shop tax-free. According to Kyodo News, the products will be taxed if purchased for resale. However, the store needs to assess the nature of the purchase.

Certain items, such as iPhones, are said to be cheaper in Japan than in other countries. According to news reports, the tax bureau suspects that suppliers want to take advantage of Japan’s tax-free system to attract tourists to Japan to buy products and then sell them abroad for profit.

In June, in response to cases where department stores purchased a large number of cosmetics and other commodities and resold them, the tax bureau issued administrative guidance to department stores, requiring them to properly sell commodities.

The cases involved a group of seven Chinese nationals who visited Japan in 2020 using tourist and other visas, and the Osaka Local Tax Bureau charged them with purchases of $5,73,26,115 (7.7 billion yen worth of luxury items, according to Kyodo News). Branded goods. It turns out that products including watches and handbags were bought for resale. (Arnie)

(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from a Syndicated News feed, the content body may not have been modified or edited by LatestLY staff)