One of the competitive advantages for online shopping has been the difficulty in levying taxes on internet transactions.
This has been particularly true in the United States where individual states, counties and cities have different sales taxes, meaning a consumer in Birmingham, Alabama might pay 10% more than their friends in Billings, Montana.
Amazon in particular has been aggressive in exploiting these price differentials, right down to threatening states where ‘Amazon taxes’ has been proposed.
Now the US Congress looks set to pass a law which would make online sellers responsible for buyers’ state sales tax obligations.
The next stage will be treaties between countries on the collection of sales or value added taxes.
For many retailers though this won’t be particularly good news as price differentials are more than just the 10% GST or VAT and online shopping sites compete as much on product range and customers service.
What the US Congress’ bill really shows is how online retailing is maturing – rather than thinking of companies like Amazon, eBay or niche operators like Shoes Of Prey as being disrupters they are the new normal.