‘Duty free’ tag brings confusion

Press, 27 December 1985, Page 1

‘Duty free’ tag brings confusion

By

LES BLOXHAM,

travel editor

The Government’s recent decision to remove duty from items such as cameras and video recorders is causing confusion among the public. Some intending travellers

apparently think it is no longer worth while to make duty-free purchases when heading overseas. Other people, who have no intention of travelling, mistakenly believe they can now buy direct from traditional airport duty-free outlets.

These shops are, however, only permitted to accept orders from travellers with confirmed international air tickets. The goods, which are exempt sales tax and (where it is still applied), duty, are picked up by passengers as they board their flight. Big savings are still possible where travellers use their $250 exemption to reduce the effect of sales tax. This exemption can further reduce the now widely

advertised “duty-free” prices for videos and cameras by as much as $4OO. For instance, “The Press” checked two items advertised since duty was removed and compared their cost with the price a traveller would pay though the airport duty-free system.

A National 450 video recorder is available to the general public for $1399 from a number of retailers.

This same machine can be bought for $829 from the Christchurch Airport dutyfree shop, but it must be taken out of the country. On returning to New Zealand, the traveller would have to pay about 37 per cent sales tax, which, after allowing for the maximum

exemption of $250, would make the total cost about $1043. This represents a saving of about $350.

A Pentax camera advertised “duty free” for $525 last week can be bought from the airport shop for $3ll. Again, after allowing for the maximum concession, the price with the camera’s 61 per cent sales ■tax added, would be about $348, a saving of about $177. Mr John Schneideman, managing director of the Christchurch International Duty Free Shop, said a lot of people had become ■confused by the increased use of the term “duty free” by ordinary retail shops. While technically correct, the term related solely to duty and should not be

confused with the traditional duty-and-tax-free goods available to international travellers, he said. Mr Schneideman has a central Christchurch shop and another at the airport. He said some people could not understand why goods in his “duty-free” shops were not available to them in the wake of the Government’s announcement.

“Perhaps we should become known as ‘duty and tax-free’ shops,” he said. Duty, 17.5 per cent on cameras and 45 per cent on video recorders, was removed two weeks ago. It is, however, still applied to many other goods, including radios and cassette recorders,