Montreal's La Presse newspaper is reporting that "two high-level government sources" have confirmed that the upcoming Quebec budget (March 27, 2018) will include new sales taxes levied on foreign tech companies like Netflix, Amazon, Google, and Apple, that do not have a Quebec presence.
As it currently stands, these non-resident foreign companies are not expected to collect sales taxes from consumers. Under current regulations, the government expects consumers to auto-report these purchases and submit the necessary taxes.
Based on a November report, the Quebec government believes it lost 270M$ during the previous fiscal year because of this collection model.
Additionally, the government believes local merchants selling online are disadvantaged by the extra tax burden
The intent will be to:
- collect sales tax on products and services (intangible) coming from outside of Canada
- collect sales tax on physical goods physical goods coming from outside of Canada
- collect sales tax on goods (tangible or intangible) coming from the rest of Canada
La Presse reports that these new tax rules will be implemented regardless of Ottawa's position or opinion.
