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Bangkok Post
Bangkok Post
Business

Excess revenue to help public

If Thailand's revenue in fiscal 2022 exceeds the government target, the Finance Ministry will spend the excess money on easing people's living costs, says the ministry's permanent secretary Krisada Chinavicharana.

He said a tax reduction could be one method of easing the people's financial burden.

The government collected net revenue of 911 billion baht during the first five months of fiscal 2022, surpassing the target by 46 billion.

Thailand set an expense target of 3.11 trillion baht and a revenue goal of 2.4 trillion for fiscal 2022.

Mr Krisada said the cabinet is set to consider some new measures on March 22 to cushion the impact of rising oil prices.

He said the government has a sufficient budget to deal with the oil price situation.

Mr Krisada said it was too early to determine whether the government will launch phase 5 of the "Khon La Khrueng" co-payment subsidy scheme once the current phase 4 expires in May.

The government cannot continue stimulus schemes forever as the economy will return to normal soon, he said.

The co-payment scheme sees the government subsidising 50% of food, drinks and general goods purchases for participants, with the total subsidy limited to 150 baht per person per day.

Speaking at a separate event, Ekniti Nitithanprapas, the Revenue Department's director-general, said it could collect 3.12 billion baht of e-service tax from foreign online platform operators based on their total service value of 44.6 billion baht from Sept 1, 2021 to January 2022.

Currently 127 foreign online platform operators have registered to pay the value-added tax (VAT) in Thailand after the e-service tax law came into force at the start of September last year.

The e-service tax law requires overseas businesses providing online services in Thailand to register for 7% VAT liability if their annual income exceeds 1.8 million baht.

From Sept 1, 2021 to January 2022, the department collected VAT of 1.96 billion baht from online advertising platforms based on total service value of 28 billion baht, and 839 million baht VAT from e-commerce platforms based on service value of 1.98 billion baht.

The department collected VAT of 282 million baht from music, movie and game platforms based on service value of 4.02 billion baht, and 12.8 million baht VAT from accommodation booking and travel ticket booking platforms based on service value of 183 million baht.

Mr Ekniti said the e-service tax is expected to generate between 8-10 billion baht in revenue in its first year, higher than the previously forecast 5 billion.

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