I purchased Ali and Temu directly, and was it a tax evasion crime? Beware of consumer damage [미드나잇 이슈]

Another purchasing agent was caught evading taxes through the so-called ‘undervalue’ method. Undervalue refers to a method of avoiding or paying less taxes by creating an invoice at a lower price than the list price when purchasing a product in an overseas transaction. While these tax evasion crimes are on the rise, caution is needed when using purchase agencies because they are using domestic consumers’ personal customs clearance codes (unique personal identification numbers required for overseas direct purchases) to make false reports.

On the 27th, Busan Headquarters Customs announced that it had sent influencer A, in his 30s, without detention on charges of violating the Customs Act and the Special Act on Imported Food Safety Management. Mr. A is suspected of selling about 30,000 foreign health supplements to about 4,500 buyers as a purchasing agent from June 2019 to November of last year and reporting them to customs at low prices. Even though Mr. A received a price including customs duties and value-added tax from buyers, it was found that he evaded about 500 million won, including 200 million won in customs duties and 300 million won in value-added taxes, by declaring the amount to be tax-exempt to customs.

It was also confirmed that Mr. A received a tariff reduction worth 15 million won by using the personal customs clearance codes of about 40 people, including family members and employees, in the process of purchasing about 16,000 health supplements to sell and promote himself. Among these, about 2,500 were found to have not even reported their imports to the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety.

The problem is that victims who purchased items through the same crime as Mr. A may also be implicated in the crime. If you search for ‘undervalue’ online, related damage counseling posts will appear. Including a post that says, ‘After ordering, I was contacted by customs asking for an explanation of the price of the product,’ there is content that provides consultation on orders suspected of being undervalued or warns of damage when using a purchasing agency. Recently, Chinese online shopping malls such as ‘Ali Express’ and ‘Temu’, where you can purchase goods at low prices, have become popular, and when using a purchasing agent, it is necessary to check whether your order has been used for tax evasion crimes.

◆Tax evasion through purchase agencies also increases due to the popularity of overseas shopping malls

According to the Korea Customs Service, as a result of an intensive crackdown on illegal overseas direct purchases from October 30 to November 28 last year, a time when large-scale discounts are concentrated such as Singles’ Day in China and Black Friday in the United States, customs duties through purchasing agents were detected for about 30 days. The portal amount reached 6.2 billion won. Distributed smuggling using the names of others amounted to 4.3 billion won.

As the use of overseas shopping malls becomes more active and these illegal transactions increase, investigative agencies are also actively investigating those who violate customs laws. Last year, the prosecution for the first time indicted a large-scale theft of personal customs clearance codes on charges of violating the Personal Information Protection Act. Last year, the Incheon District Prosecutors’ Office arrested and indicted Mr. B, a luxury goods purchasing agent, who evaded approximately 29 million won in taxes by arbitrarily stealing personal customs clearance codes. Mr. B was put on trial on charges of importing luxury goods worth approximately 440 million won by falsely declaring them and evading approximately 29 million won in customs duties on a total of 142 occasions from June 2018 to April of last year.

Mr. B evaded customs duties by arbitrarily stealing the personal customs clearance codes of buyers he obtained while running an online blog for purchasing overseas luxury goods.

◆Tax evasion by purchasing agents, possibility that consumers are also involved… To prevent damage

In the undervalue method, sellers use the buyer’s personal customs clearance code to evade taxes, causing damage to the buyer. According to the Customs Act, the person liable to pay taxes is the buyer who receives the goods. In order to prevent such damage in 2020, the government will also impose tax liability on overseas direct purchase agents if the purchasing agent defrauds the buyer by providing false price information to the import declarant after receiving the tariff. and punished for customs evasion.

However, buyers may also need to fully explain their possible involvement in a crime, so they must carefully check the purchase price and reported price when using a purchasing agency. You can check the customs clearance process of purchased goods through ‘Overseas Direct Purchase Customs Clearance Information Inquiry’ on the Korea Customs Service website ‘Overseas Direct Purchase Here’. Alternatively, if there is a significant difference between the purchase price and the reported price by comparing your purchase history with the import declaration certificate, you should suspect such criminal damage.

Reporter Ahn Kyung-jun [email protected]

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