Govt to tax kombis, hairdressers

Source: Govt to tax kombis, hairdressers – DailyNews Live

Farayi Machamire      28 March 2017

HARARE – Broke President Robert Mugabe’s government has introduced taxes
for commuter operators – popularly known as kombis – and hairdressers, as
part of desperate moves to raise funds.

According to last Friday’s gazette, authorities were given legal teeth to
compel the “operators of hairdressing salons (to pay) $10 per chair per
month” while “informal cross border traders (will pay) 10 per centum of
the value for duty purposes of the commercial goods being imported…”

“Operators of omnibuses for the carriage of passengers with a seating
capacity for 15 to 25 passengers will be required to pay $45 while those
of between 25 and 36 passengers will part with $70 a month,” it added.

The new wave of taxes, with effect from January 1 2017, brought into being
by the Finance Act 2017, will also affect driving school operators, with
those for class four vehicles being required to pay $100 per month.

Class one and two vehicles operators will part with $130 a month.

This comes as the government has been struggling to service its burgeoning
expenditure and failing to pay civil servants on time due to severely
strained revenue streams.

“The presumptive tax chargeable in terms of Section 36C of the Taxes Act
shall be in case of…operators of taxi cabs for the carriage of
passengers for hire or reward having seating accommodation for not more
than seven passengers, $25 per month for each such taxi cab so operated,”
the gazette reads.

“Operators of goods vehicles having a carrying capacity of more than 10
tonnes but less than 20 tonnes, $200,” the gazette reads, adding that
goods vehicles of 20 tonnes or more will be required to pay $500 per
month.

Companies which are not resident in Zimbabwe but “carries on a business in
Zimbabwe through a permanent establishment in Zimbabwe” will be liable to
tax.

The meaning of permanent establishment, according to the gazette, is a
company that has a fixed place of business in the country through which
the business of the company is wholly or partly carried on.

Meanwhile, there was some relief for small scale miners whose presumptive
tax is being calculated at zero percent of each dollar of the purchase
price of metals.