Beijing, Shanghai benefit overseas tourists with tax refund
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E-mail China Daily, July 6, 2015
Starting from the beginning of this month, Beijing and Shanghai began offering tax refunds on purchases made by overseas visitors, in a bid to bolster tourism and sales.
86 stores in Beijing and 27 in Shanghai have qualified for the tax refund program, which covers all kinds of goods popular with overseas travelers, such as souvenirs, silk, porcelain, antique and traditional Chinese medicine products as well as some outlets.
Zhao Yanming is the deputy director of Beijing Municipal Finance Bureau. He explains, the minimum purchase to obtain a tax refund is 500 yuan at a single store in one day.
"Overseas travelers refer to foreigners and residents from Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan, who continuously stay in the Chinese mainland for no more than 183 days. The time period between leaving date and purchasing date should not exceed 90 days. When they leave the Chinese mainland, they can claim 11% refund, of which they can receive 9%, and the other 2% is the commission charge to those refund agencies."
Now, overseas visitors can claim tax refund at Beijing Capital International Airport, as well as Shanghai airports at both Pudong and Hongqiao when they leave China.
Gao Yanjun from Beijing capital international airport customs explains the procedure for claiming the tax refund.
"Travelers should go to check in their flights first. Then they should take the goods with their luggage to the Customs for application and verification, together with the refund application form and sales invoice from tax free store. After verification, the Customs will sign and stamp on the application form and help to put the luggage into the Sorting System, saving the travellers time to go back to the check in counter again."
Finally, overseas visitors should deliver the application form with custom's signature and stamp to the tax refund agencies to claim their money.
Yuan Baiwei from Shanghai Municipal Finance Bureau elaborates:
"The currency of tax refund is RMB. The payment method will be either cash or bank transfer. Overseas travelers can choose one of the two payment methods, if the tax refund amount is less than 10 thousand yuan. If the refund amount is over 10 thousand yuan, it must be done by bank transfer."
Next, the two cities will explore the expansion of the tax refund program to more stores and offer processing of refunds outside of the airports.
Additionally, Beijing, which added a 72-hour visa-free policy to boost tourism, plans to introduce shopping-tailored tourism routes for overseas visitors.
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