Importers told to remove luxury cars from tax-free zones in 90 days.

 

BANGKOK:-- The Customs Department yesterday issued a statement asking importers to remove their imported luxury vehicles left at tax-free zones for over two years otherwise their vehicles will be either seized or discarded.

 

Importers of these vehicles are given 90 days to remove.

 

Announcement of the Customs Department came after the military junta recently issued an order under Article 44 of the Interim Constitution involving grey-market imports of luxury and high-end sports cars.

 

Under the order, importers who have imported these vehicles prior to August 25,  2014 – or have exceeded the 2 year allowance period and which are still in tax-free zones or free enterprise zones in industrial estates, must remove the vehicles within 90 days.

 

In elaborating on this, Customs Department director-general Kulit Sombatsiri stated that failure to remove the vehicles within the 90 day period will result in seizure and the Customs Department will then have the right to either put the vehicles up for public sale or have them destroyed.

 

Records show that between 2009 – 2015, there were altogether 633 grey market import vehicles still being kept in these tax-free zones. Most are high-end luxury automobiles or sports cars.However he said that other vehicles that are currently being kept in these zones but have yet to exceed the 2 year allowance period will be allowed to remain where they are until the 2 year term runs its course.

 

Of these, 71 are Lamborghini ‘supercars’ and another 127 are expensive Mercedes Benz luxury automobiles and sports cars.

 

Almost all are not current models but older models of the respective brands that have failed to find buyers and have remained in the importers stocks.

 

The grey-market importers of these vehicles do  not wish to put these vehicles up for sale and have kept them in these tax-free zones as to do so would mean having to pay very high import taxes.

 

In all, there are altogether 326 such vehicles that have been kept in these areas by importers to avoid paying import taxes.

 

Source: http://englishnews.thaipbs.or.th/importers-told-remove-luxury-cars-tax-free-zones-90-days/

 

 

 

-- © Copyright Thai PBS 2016-08-27

"...... the Customs Department will then have the right to either put the vehicles up for public sale or have them destroyed."

 

Get on with it then.    

Customs, second most corrupt department. Never investigated!

I'd say sell them and give the proceeds to landless farmers.

What can they, ship them to another country ?

Charge a per day storage fee, maybe 2000 baht per day with a  maximum 2 years storage. Storage to be paid on a monthly basis.

If not removed, attach an import tax and storage fees, not paid, and auction the vehicles for the amount owed. Any excess would

be donated to the Thai Health Services to pay for poor Thai Healthcare! Of course, all transactions be done with Supervision,

so Corruption does not play a part in this scheme.

6 minutes ago, tomwct said:

Charge a per day storage fee, maybe 2000 baht per day with a  maximum 2 years storage. Storage to be paid on a monthly basis.

If not removed, attach an import tax and storage fees, not paid, and auction the vehicles for the amount owed. Any excess would

be donated to the Thai Health Services to pay for poor Thai Healthcare! Of course, all transactions be done with Supervision,

so Corruption does not play a part in this scheme.

good suggestions but please do consider the plight of the importers as well. they must be having good reason for not clearing their imports.

I wonder how many extensions they will get on the 90 day notices

34 minutes ago, sahibji said:

good suggestions but please do consider the plight of the importers as well. they must be having good reason for not clearing their imports.

 

Yeah, high end luxury vehicles.

 

Stand by here comes my consideration.

 

..........

 

OK, that's  done.

 

Maybe the good reason is they cannot find any buyers, and to ship them back to whence they came presents a similar problem of import tax, registration, transport costs and finding a buyer.

3 hours ago, ratcatcher said:

"...... the Customs Department will then have the right to either put the vehicles up for public sale or have them destroyed."

 

Get on with it then.    

nothing of value is ever destroyed here. it is sold out the back door or simply vanishes.

2000 per day? that's chump change. Barely 1.5million in 2 years.

1 hour ago, sahibji said:

good suggestions but please do consider the plight of the importers as well. they must be having good reason for not clearing their imports.

Yea, like paying the import tax.   Expect they originally hoped to slip the vehicle through via "under the table payment/stuffed envelope" and that didn't work out for some reason.

Edited August 27, 20169 yr by Pib

21 minutes ago, Pib said:

Yea, like paying the import tax.   Expect they originally hoped to slip the vehicle through via "under the table payment/stuffed envelope" and that didn't work out for some reason.

 

And the reason is...?

2 hours ago, sahibji said:

good suggestions but please do consider the plight of the importers as well. they must be having good reason for not clearing their imports.

...why don't they just seize them....

 

...stored/parked for free for 2 years....???

 

...and if they are here illegally to begin with....???

 

...why the courtesy....???

 

...something not right about this.....

3 hours ago, sahibji said:

good suggestions but please do consider the plight of the importers as well. they must be having good reason for not clearing their imports.

Good reason, yeah - haven't been able to ship them out the back door with unpaid duty - sad isn't it?

4 hours ago, does said:

I'd say sell them and give the proceeds to landless farmers.

so they can sell that land "again" and become landless

4 hours ago, sahibji said:

good suggestions but please do consider the plight of the importers as well. they must be having good reason for not clearing their imports.

 

 

YES, there is NO market for them. Remember these cars still belong to the factory, the dealers took them on consignment.  Many years ago the  Alfa Romeo Italian car factory got caught in this pickle in exporting on consignment cars to Thailand and in the end donated the cars to the Thai Highway Police. Which action then cleared the charges owned and the problems for the Thai Highway Police began due to these cars being of the high maintenance type which the Thai Highway Police car maintenance budget was not set up for to handle so after a couple years the Alfa Romeo cars all had disappeared out the Highway Police organization.

Just now, swerver said:

 

 

YES, there is NO market for them. Remember these cars still belong to the factory, the dealers took them on consignment.  Many years ago the  Alfa Romeo Italian car factory got caught in this pickle in exporting on consignment cars to Thailand and in the end donated the cars to the Thai Highway Police. Which action then cleared the charges owned and the problems for the Thai Highway Police began due to these cars being of the high maintenance type which the Thai Highway Police car maintenance budget was not set up for to handle so after a couple years the Alfa Romeo cars all had disappeared out the Highway Police organization.

Car factorys don't give vehicles to Grey Importers there you go boys now undercut our Dealers

2 hours ago, SOTIRIOS said:

...why don't they just seize them....

 

...stored/parked for free for 2 years....???

 

...and if they are here illegally to begin with....???

 

...why the courtesy....???

 

...something not right about this.....

 

I don't see any mention of the storage fees in the OP, but I highly doubt that it is for free.

they do like their 90days don't they

Seized, Confiscated YES  Destroyed??  NEVER  each Customs official has a Mia Noi that would love a new car.

 

The reason they are still there is the dealers reluctance to discount. If you look online you can find "brand new" 4 year old luxury cars with the sticker price unchanged from when the car first arrived.

There are countless examples of cars that have sat in the showroom unsold for a year or more but in true Thai fashion the dealer is holding out to get the as delivered "new" price.

I've been watching a "new" unsold 2012 TT-RS in BKK.. The price hasn't moved since 2013 and funny enough neither has the car. They just don't seem to realize that their stock is a depreciating asset and at some point they need to cut their loses and reduce the price to clear the stock. 

I was looking at a 2014 AMG on one2car  it's one owner with a few thousand KM. The owner would have paid 5.6mil new. He is selling for 4.9mil.. Unfortunately Merc now sells the updated 2016 model for 4.3mil new.. The guy has no chance of selling.

Edited August 27, 20169 yr by Pdaz

11 hours ago, ratcatcher said:

"...... the Customs Department will then have the right to either put the vehicles up for public sale or have them destroyed."

 

Get on with it then.    

 

They can try and recover the unpaid taxes in YouTube advertising fees from the videos of them trashing Lambos and high end Mercedes.  :-)

time to buy cheap hehehe

All of the taxes and fees are presented prior to shipment. When the vehicle arrives here the fees are significantly more than initially expected. Then try to export the car from this lot? They will not allow it because you don’t have the paperwork you get after you pay the taxes/fees you were expectantly hit with upon arrival.

 

2 years later Thailand announces they will no longer sell the 91 fuel here. Good luck with running E20 in those!

good suggestions but please do consider the plight of the importers as well. they must be having good reason for not clearing their imports.

Probably because they are physically already in traffic but virtually still in the tax-free zone.

Lot of "problem solving" ahead I assume.

The first sentence says the cars will either be sold or discarded which I presume means destroyed but some of the cars won't have to worry as they'll find a nice new home.

Just how many have already been earmarked for senior customs officials   ?

9 hours ago, swerver said:

 

 

YES, there is NO market for them. Remember these cars still belong to the factory, the dealers took them on consignment.  

 

Not if they are grey market imports, which the article does mention.

I wonder if these cars will be black listed and returned to their own country?