The Excise Department is restructuring the cigarette tax and will soon submit its proposal to Finance Minister Korn Chatikavanij, said director-general Areepong Bhoocha-oom.
He did not reveal the details but said he had consulted with importers and producers. Importers have complained that the department applies discriminatory tax rates on some items: for example, it does not collect tax on roll-your-own tobacco while imposing high tax rates on foreign cigarette brands. Areepong, however, ruled out any possibility of tax hikes on cigarettes, beer, liquor or oil this year, since the department had raised tax rates on these products in May last year.
He said the department would also change the way it calculates tax on some items, such as vehicles. It would take a while before the department could come up with new method to calculate production cost of car, which would affect tax rates. He also promised to streamline excise-tax collection on all products, saying manufacturers would get better service from the department.
He said that in the first nine months of the fiscal year, from October to June, the department's tax receipts were Bt306 billion, exceeding the previous target estimated at Bt291 billion. Taxes from beer, liquor, cigarettes, oil, cars and non-alcohol beverages accounted for 95 per cent.