The Tribune

EDITOR, The Tribune

FROM a business perspective, the logistics of dealing with VAT has spiralled out of control. Not only is the reporting tedious, do not even think you will get a refund when due, but now payment of VAT is being further complicated.

Initially, VAT could be paid online (if you have that facility), with cash (if you are so foolish as to carry cash in Nassau these days), or by cheque (the safest method). Apparently, this has changed and you can no longer pay by a cheque drawn on your business account. You now have to purchase a cashier’s cheque, with the attendant charges that the bank levies and VAT on said charges.

This has taken the entire process into a landscape better suited to “Alice in Wonderland”.

Not only do we not have even an inkling of where the VAT money is going, but now, miraculously in one stroke, they have found an even further means of raising VAT through the cashier’s cheques. We should note here that even if you pay online, the bank charges a service charge for this to which VAT also applies.

Where will this end?

FRUSTRATED BUSINESS OWNER

Nassau,

November 3, 2015