1054 replies to this topic

[sebberry]

I could have sworn we had some more recent discussion on HST...

Anyway, my hair cut was 50 cents cheaper today. That's $8.67 I'll save this year. Actually it's $8.67 more that my hairdresser will make in tips as I always make it an "even twenty".

[jonny]

As my organization is still in the midst of re-learning PST, I can tell you, unequivocally, that this tax is a piece of garbage. GST/HST is a beautiful thing in comparison.

The legislation is garbage. The branch in charge of administering this tax is nearly non-existant. Questions take weeks to get responses on. Their rulings department isn't even operating yet. Not to mention the tax itself is a confusing, inconsistent, piece of crap.

Oh, and we are losing out on ITCs.

[sebberry]

Tell us how you really feel, jonny!

[Sparky]

I could have sworn we had some more recent discussion on HST...

Anyway, my hair cut was 50 cents cheaper today. That's $8.67 I'll save this year. Actually it's $8.67 more that my hairdresser will make in tips as I always make it an "even twenty".

You get your hair cut 17.34 times a year?

[VicHockeyFan]

You get your hair cut 17.34 times a year?

His haircuts don't fit squarely into one calendar year. One year it might be 17, next 17, next 18, next 17, next 17.... Get it?

[sebberry]

I better shine a brighter light on my solar powered calculator.. or drink more coffee.

I completely botched that one up.

52/6=8.67. 8.67 hair cuts per year x .50 cents = $4.34 in tax saved.

Even if I didn't tip the hairdresser the extra 50 cents, $4.34 isn't enough for a new calculator.

[VicHockeyFan]

Even if I didn't tip the hairdresser the extra 50 cents, $4.34 isn't enough for a new calculator.

Lotsa $1.25 calculators at the $1.25 store on Douglas.

[jonny]

Tell us how you really feel, jonny!

I'm not afraid to do that!

Just grabbed a coffee from Bean Around the World...asked the girl at the till why they hadn't reduced their price to reflect the elimination of the HST and she just stared at me blankly...lol

I noticed that Habit has reduced their (after tax) coffee price by $.10, which isn't exactly 7%, but at least it's close.

[Bingo]

A medium coffee at Discovery on Oak Bay Ave used to be $2.50 and is now $2.10.

[Matt R.]

We raised our prices by a few pennies on all non-alc beverages to round to a nickel after tax due to the elimination of the penny. Not getting screwed by 'rounding' in Fulford!!

Net price to our guests on non-alc beverges is down a little bit, haven't heard a peep but if I do I will take the opportunity to remind them that the price of cups, lids, sleeves, napkins, stir sticks, sugar caddies, take-out bags, tongs, etc just went up.

Matt.

[tedward]

As my organization is still in the midst of re-learning PST, I can tell you, unequivocally, that this tax is a piece of garbage. GST/HST is a beautiful thing in comparison.

The removal of the HST will be studied in the future as an example of an electorate being led by emotion and media bias rather than actually rationally examining the facts. The HST was never actually debated in either the legislature or in the subsequent referendum in any meaningful way.

The BC electorate deserves a grade of F in civics.

[http]

The removal of the HST will be studied in the future as an example of an electorate being led by emotion and media bias rather than actually rationally examining the facts. The HST was never actually debated in either the legislature or in the subsequent referendum in any meaningful way.

The BC electorate deserves a grade of F in civics.

Absolutely! The people who foisted it on them in a shoud of lies and spectacular public relations miscues, however, deserve as bad a grade.

If they really felt it was such the improvement for everyone, it should have been an easy sell to everyone - not just bookkeepers, contractors, and home buyers - during the campaign.

[Matt R.]

I fielded an email complaint from a guest who was in yesterday, telling me that she was charged GST on her meal, when that was supposed to have gone away April 1.

I thought at first she was just confused, what with all the letters and TLAs but she actually thought ALL tax was being repealed on restaurant meals.

Short memories.

Matt.

[jonny]

The removal of the HST will be studied in the future as an example of an electorate being led by emotion and media bias rather than actually rationally examining the facts. The HST was never actually debated in either the legislature or in the subsequent referendum in any meaningful way.

The BC electorate deserves a grade of F in civics.

Absolutely! The people who foisted it on them in a shoud of lies and spectacular public relations miscues, however, deserve as bad a grade.

If they really felt it was such the improvement for everyone, it should have been an easy sell to everyone - not just bookkeepers, contractors, and home buyers - during the campaign.

It was an epic failure on both accounts. Really, all the Liberals had to do was point to every single economic and financial expert who was happy to say how beneficial HST would be. Instead, they played everybody for ignorant fools and tried to weasel it in through the side door.

They also could have, I'm sure, negotiated some of the PST exemptions into the BC HST, like food. Gas for example, remained at only 5% HST when the PST was repealed.

Anyway, it's done now I suppose. It won't be touched for a while. You watch, every single province (aside from Quebec and provinces with GST only) will have HST before too long, and BC will be looking to make the move (again)! I think the only ones left are Saskatchewan and Manitoba.

I was at an accounting professional development sales tax course a couple of months ago. The instructor had the entire room shaking their head when he said "BC is the only jurisdiction in the WORLD to go from a value added tax to a retail sales tax. Everywhere else is going the other way." The big benefit is input tax credits for business. *Sigh*

[Dimitrios]

All they needed to do was reduce it by 1%, to make an 11% HST. That way, consumers would see some tangible benefits on some purchases, in order to offset the pain of new tax on food, etc. It would have been a tradeoff, rather than just a negative or no change on all purchases. This seemed SO obvious.

[drt]

Didn't the Liberals promise to eventually reduce it to 11%?

[VicHockeyFan]

^Yes, they did, some time in the future.

All they needed to do was reduce it by 1%, to make an 11% HST. That way, consumers would see some tangible benefits on some purchases, in order to offset the pain of new tax on food, etc. It would have been a tradeoff, rather than just a negative or no change on all purchases. This seemed SO obvious.

Yes, that probably would have done it. Very sad.

[VicHockeyFan]

You watch, every single province (aside from Quebec and provinces with GST only) will have HST before too long, and BC will be looking to make the move (again)! I think the only ones left are Saskatchewan and Manitoba.

Probably.

[G-Man]

For purely nationalistic reasons I prefer the PST despite the HST being a more sound financial choice perhaps this is what other BC'ers were thinking when they voted.

[crabbygit]

This is an old thread I can see, but wanted to add my 2 cents, I have read through previous posts but of course not all so some of my comments maybe, most likely are mute.

 

I operate a small business have done for 21 years just my wife and I the HST was detrimental to my business as I had to add that 7% to the cost of my service where it didn't previously exist.

While I can agree that bookkeeping was easier than it is with two separate taxes I would say that the attempt to install the HST was a Federally instigated attempt to unlawfully tax British Columbians and this won't be the end of the story as they will come back to the trough, but from a different angle next time . Yes large corporations were 100% in favour of HST as it benefits them, this was evidenced by the magnitude of corporate objection to the Fight HST campaign and the corporate funding they provided for the lawsuit to stop it.