Govt. may not have enough budget to cover the year's first car buyer rebates

BANGKOK, 8 April 2014, (NNT) - According to a source in the Finance Ministry, the government is likely to exhaust the 40 billion baht of its 2014 budget for rebates in the first car buyer scheme, before completing the year's payments this June.

The source said the Excise Department has paid 30.78 billion baht of the budget to eligible individuals, adding that the remaining 9.21 billion baht would only be enough to make the payments for another one or two months. Some of those eligible to claim the rebate may not be able to receive their money within that time frame.

The source said if the budget is completely exhausted, the government would have to wait until the next round of budget disbursement to set aside sufficient funds for the rebate, pointing out that, given the government’s interim status, the process would take longer as it needs the Election Commission’s approval, on top of the regular procedures.

If the government decides to continue to make the payments, the Excise Department would have to submit a draft budget to the Finance Ministry for consideration and to seek the funds. The source further elaborated that the rebate can be funded by borrowing either tax money or treasury reserves. The borrowed funds would then have to be returned within the course of the next fiscal year as stated by the law.

-- NNT 2014-04-08

This must be Suthep's fault too.

They can't find 166 million pounds? What clucking sad state this country is turning into.

They can't find 166 million pounds? What clucking sad state this country is turning into.

I bet they "could" find it if they wanted to . . . and I'd start by checking the bank accounts of all the PT MP's and their friends, families and business associates . . . pretty damn likely their individual wealth has increased somewhat (substantially) since taking office.

This is a strange report .. my understanding of the tax rebate was that the vehicle manufacturer actually paid the tax to the government and then the government after 12 months would pay it to the consumer .. you would have thought that rather than not having enough money they would actually have MORE due to interest paid on that money .... ahh well!

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Hub of failed promises.

This must be Suthep's fault too.

50bln lost every months since the beginning of protests, so now over 250bln. Tax on it some 20%. The most hit government departments were tax and customs

This refund is the main reason most people bought a car for the first time last year. Many borrowed money for downpayments with the intention to use the rebate to repay borrow monies. With this in mind i imagine their are going to even more pissed off people angry at this administration soon. If they know already that they are running out of money then why dont they make their requests now to get more funds so they dont screw the people over even more

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My wife has applied for her rebate but has been informed that she may have to wait until after the political problems and a new government is elected, then there is no guarantee.

I predicted this months ago

Will the first car buyers be in front or behind the rice farmers

in getting their payments, If the truth ever came out about what

has been going on with this government,it would shock the nation,

but the most disturbing thing is they will most likely be reelected,

Thai politics one of the worlds great mysteries.or believe it or not.

regards Worgeordie

This is a strange report .. my understanding of the tax rebate was that the vehicle manufacturer actually paid the tax to the government and then the government after 12 months would pay it to the consumer .. you would have thought that rather than not having enough money they would actually have MORE due to interest paid on that money .... ahh well!

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This from the Board of Investment website.

http://www.boi.go.th/tir/issue/201110_21_10/174.htm

The government has approved guidelines for a first-car buyer program that it hopes will contribute to the growth of the automotive industry by refunding taxes for first-time car buyers. A central fund will be established with 100 million baht from the 2012 national budget to carry out the program and another fund of 30 billion baht from the 2013 national budget for tax refunds.

I want to know why PM Yingluck dissolved Parliament. No law or court said she had to. She never listened to Suthep before or after. Why didn't she, at least, make arrangements to continue the promised spending before she dissolved Parliament? I have a theory. Dr. Thaksin told her to. He thought that quick elections, which he was sure PTP would win, would give the government a fresh mandate to keep on hiding all the corruption under the surface. He was counting on the, off-budget, Bt. 2.2 trillion Infrastructure Improvement bill, that was written to be unaccounted for in its spending, to hide all the defects and theft in the other schemes. The Democrats caused him to fail with a boycott in 2006 and again in 2014. His self-confidence is unwarranted and is always at the root of his failures. Sad that Thai people cannot trust their government to keep its commitments. Sad that the government has conspired with Thaksin to steal all the money so there is none left for the people.

PTP populist election promises:

Tablets for school going school children - FAIL

Rice subsidy scheme - MASSIVE FAIL for the farmers and some farmers are worse off than before

First Car Rebates - FAIL

Minumum wage of THB 300/day ???

Minimum salary for Uni students - 15k/m ??

Dear Poo dont seem to be doing to well with the election scams promises

It's all bloody Suthep's fault that the world is going to find out what the recent Government has been up to. The nerve of the man, actually wanting to get rid of the corrupt, self serving dictators, it's just not cricket we tell you. How dare you do this Suthep, echo the many sympathising TVF members, it is undemocratic to stop them from raping and pillaging the country and it's people as they were democratically elected and cost them a lot of money to buy those democratic votes. Democracy will suffer, as we always fastidiously and pedantically explain to you in our own very democratic way.

We can stop this man Suthep says the red primates, we will kill and maim and blame it on him, we will spread falsities about him and we can even engineer serious charges against him, it's easy we just pay everybody to believe us and we have all those moronic farangs on their forums to spread the word amongst the international community that we have been democratically screwed . Lets face it, those losers are outcasts from their own country so they need us, we don't need them, otherwise why would they be suck holing to us. We can win because ours is bigger than Sutheps.

This must be Suthep's fault too.

50bln lost every months since the beginning of protests, so now over 250bln. Tax on it some 20%. The most hit government departments were tax and customs

Some nice round figures there...issued by whom exactly? Ask yourself that question first then ask yourself: Did 50000 people having an extended BBQ really cost the country 1.7 billion a day? Really?? The only thing that really started costing monet was the SOE which restricts trade directly.

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It was also reported there were 160,000 new car order cancellations. That should have eased the budget considerably, but they still have run out of funds? It also says that because of this 100,000 cars were over produced by the Thai auto industry. Potentially huge losses for the industry.

http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/669757-160000-first-car-cancellations/#entry6851662

Since we're talking about 'restitution' of already paid excise taxes, it would seem some more unsound fiscal practises by the government.

PTP populist election promises:

Tablets for school going school children - FAIL

Rice subsidy scheme - MASSIVE FAIL for the farmers and some farmers are worse off than before

First Car Rebates - FAIL

Minumum wage of THB 300/day ???

Minimum salary for Uni students - 15k/m ??

Dear Poo dont seem to be doing to well with the election scams promises

First Home ownership - maximum price of home increased at least once to attract sufficient buyers, unknown status

Get Thaksin back - FAIL

Awesome. Great planning guys.

Lots of feathers out there knocking over gullible PTP supporters again.

Impossible. It was a brilliant idea to flood the streets with small cars. Ha ha ha.

This is a strange report .. my understanding of the tax rebate was that the vehicle manufacturer actually paid the tax to the government and then the government after 12 months would pay it to the consumer .. you would have thought that rather than not having enough money they would actually have MORE due to interest paid on that money .... ahh well!

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Oh right. And they keep your pension no ey in a pot to give back to you at 65? The moneys been spent and they can't increase allocation as a temporary government.

PTP populist election promises:

Tablets for school going school children - FAIL

Rice subsidy scheme - MASSIVE FAIL for the farmers and some farmers are worse off than before

First Car Rebates - FAIL

Minumum wage of THB 300/day ???

Minimum salary for Uni students - 15k/m ??

Dear Poo dont seem to be doing to well with the election scams promises

..dont forget the 20baht BTS flat fee...FAILED at that too.

In fact...she failed at everything she promised or touched.

Surprise surprise !!!

PTP incompetence is evident in every thing they touch.

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I want to know why PM Yingluck dissolved Parliament. No law or court said she had to. She never listened to Suthep before or after. Why didn't she, at least, make arrangements to continue the promised spending before she dissolved Parliament? I have a theory. Dr. Thaksin told her to. He thought that quick elections, which he was sure PTP would win, would give the government a fresh mandate to keep on hiding all the corruption under the surface. He was counting on the, off-budget, Bt. 2.2 trillion Infrastructure Improvement bill, that was written to be unaccounted for in its spending, to hide all the defects and theft in the other schemes. The Democrats caused him to fail with a boycott in 2006 and again in 2014. His self-confidence is unwarranted and is always at the root of his failures. Sad that Thai people cannot trust their government to keep its commitments. Sad that the government has conspired with Thaksin to steal all the money so there is none left for the people.

Well said. Additional point, why have the poor unpaid rice farmers, some unpaid for over six months, most with very limited resources and very limited options, gone totally quiet.

There must be a specific reason, they were protesting strongly and angrily in Bangkok and some regional centers, and in big numbers, suddenly they went totally quiet, love to know why.

<script type='text/javascript'>window.mod_pagespeed_start = Number(new Date());</script>

PTP populist election promises:

Tablets for school going school children - FAIL

Rice subsidy scheme - MASSIVE FAIL for the farmers and some farmers are worse off than before

First Car Rebates - FAIL

Minumum wage of THB 300/day ???

Minimum salary for Uni students - 15k/m ??

Dear Poo dont seem to be doing to well with the election scams promises

..dont forget the 20baht BTS flat fee...FAILED at that too.

In fact...she failed at everything she promised or touched.

You could even say she failed at being a fake pm.

Government to go broke in first-car tax refund



BANGKOK: -- The Finance Ministry has no money to refund first-car buyers who have now occupied their vehicles for one year and are eligible for the tax refunds.

According to Daily News, the caretaker government has set aside 40 billion baht on its 2014 budget to refund excise tax to those car buyers under the government’s populist first-car buying scheme.

However the money set aside for refund is now insufficient to pay first car buyers who have occupied their cars for a full one year to be eligible for excise tax refund.

The Excise Department has filed information of eligible car buyers for the tax refund to the Comptroller General’s Department and so far 30.87 billion baht have been paid to car buyers.

It now has 9.21 billion baht left which is payable to car buyers in just 1-2 months, meaning that car buyers joining the scheme might not be able for payment this fiscal year but be delayed until the new allocation is set aside.

The local daily quoted a source as saying that payment of tax refund to car buyers is about 4-5 billion baht a month, while the remaining 9.2 billion baht will be paid up just in June.

Therefore, first car buyers will have to wait until the new allocation is to be set aside by the caretaker government which has to seek approval from the Election Commission because the payment committed to the next government.

The process for approval is time consuming and first car buyers are certain to get their tax refund late, the source said.

Latest figure released by the Comptroller General’s Department in March showed that a total of 901,731 first-car buyers who have occupied their vehicles for a full one year have received tax refund amounted to 63.35 billion baht.

A total of 1.25 million first-car buyers have entered the scheme with excise tax to be refunded amounted to 92.18 billion baht.

This month, the Comptroller General’s Department will transfer 4.08 billion baht to the bank accounts of a total of 53,700 eligible first-car buyers as tax refunds.

Source: http://englishnews.thaipbs.or.th/government-go-broke-first-car-tax-refund/


-- Thai PBS 2014-04-08

Incredible. Why do these funds have to be "allocated". Its not as though no one knew it wasn't coming. Why isn't this type of thing budgeted and approved?