In the second quarter of this year, when GST was introduced, there was a slight confusion for prepaid services when both the Royal Malaysian Customs Department and MCMC issued different statements about the implementation of GST for top-ups just before Labour day. MCMC clarified later that the newly introduced system of adding the tax onto the top-up will stay. When Budget 2016 was tabled in October, it was announced that prepaid users will get rebates for the GST next year, for the whole year. The mechanism for the rebate system was finally announced yesterday and it will happen automatically without any action from users’ side. The rebates too are only for Malaysian prepaid users, who have registered using MyKad or army/police identity cards.
The rebate system that was revealed by MCMC resets the top-up denominations back to pre-GST prices where a RM 10 reload will cost just that, including the 6% GST. This means that the airtime that a user will initially receive upon purchase will be reduced to RM 9.43, and the remaining 57 cents will be collected and remitted to the Royal Malaysian Customs Department. The rebate system will then kick-in and the service providers (SPs) will reimburse the taxed amount (RM 0.57) back into the user’s prepaid account within the first 24 hours of purchase. The roaming charges too will be refunded accordingly as they are a zero-rated service, and therefore they are not taxed.
The system does not require for the consumers to re-register themselves to receive refunds (as it will be done automatically), but they are are required to verify the data that they’ve had previously provided to telcos when the account/line was first registered/purchased. Preferably, the verification should happen before January 1st to ensure eligibility. New customers who signup next year will only have to ensure that they use a valid MyKad or army/police IDs during the registration of a new line. Telcos too are expected be a lot more careful with the registrations as MCMC has been issuing compounds for fake/false registrations.
Do note however that the rebate system is not valid for the purchase of a new SIM pack. The packs come with GST already included and the SPs will not reimburse those. Value Added Services (VAS) are also subject to GST, and users will be taxed (but not reimbursed) if they’re subscribed to any of the services offered. In addition to starter packs, prepaid reloads, and VAS, other taxed and rebate-less telco services include voice, SMS, data, IDD calls, Air Cash service, and mobile content. Despite those, GST is not applied on the registration of an account or line itself as there are no registration fees collected by the telcos.
As for the old stocks of prepaid reload cards, all telcos, dealers, and agents are required to sell them at their pre-GST prices. SPs and resellers are given 15 days to comply with the directive come 1st January 2016.
The new rebate system will go into effect on the 1st of January 2016 and will be valid for the whole of 2016, until the 31st of December. The government will announce later if there is an extension to the rebates program for the coming years, or if a better mechanism that is useful to the people gets approved (but this will be unlikely as the changes require a huge amount of time and money to execute).
Please head on to the Communications and Multimedia Consumer Forum of Malaysia (CFM) site for more info and to view the FAQ on the prepaid mechanism.
Commentary
According the FAQ Mechanism posted on the Communications and Multimedia Consumer Forum of Malaysia (CFM) site, the rebates are given to prepaid users as the government believes that these are made up of mainly students and those who belong to the B40 group (Malaysians with an average monthly income of below RM 2,537). This is also why the postpaid users have been disregarded.
On a personal note, I’m left wondering how the conclusion was reached when at times the monthly top-ups themselves can go beyond the charges of monthly postpaid plan. This is in part due to some of the operators and resellers who prefer to have the customers coming back for more prepaid reloads instead of advising them to move to a more cost effective postpaid plan; it would seem that telcos do not necessarily encourage the move to postpaid plans because prepaid plans in general offer a worse return over investment to the subscribers.
As for the rebates system itself, some have called it a little complicated and questioned the need for the 24-hour time frame to return the taxed amount. The runaround method has also received flak from the public who are questioning the rationale behind the unnecessary procedure as well the turn-around time for the refund.
I personally believe the rebates are good but the mechanism itself seems to be pointless way of confusing everyone involved. The automated rebates system should work accordingly but how many of us have seen technology not living up to all that it was made out to be? In any case, will all prepaid users be monitoring their accounts to see if the refunds have indeed been given back? Would it be worth the while to call/contact the telcos, and more importantly wait to be attended to, if the reimbursements don’t work as they’re supposed to? We’ll find out soon enough.
The post Telcos to give rebates for prepaid reloads in 2016 – within 24 hours after top-up appeared first on TechAttack.my.