I was reading an interesting point that here in BC they are scrapping this HST system that was introduced awhile ago and are now reverting back to an old tax system called the PST. This obviously requires a lot of businesses to update its system while registering for the tax as well. Apparently a large chunk of businesses have not done this yet. Therefore, for many consumers you may end up having to pay more taxes on an item simply because the business didn’t update the tax for its business yet.

I can imagine a lot of arguments between the business and consumers as a result of this. For the consumer I suppose this means you have to be more diligent in checking the receipt to make sure that you aren’t being charged more than you should. For those who live in BC and are confused at what items are say tax exempt you can see a good list at http://www2.gov.bc.ca/assets/gov/topic/BED47DA4EBDBA60A5F28622B8B2E1451/uploads/whats_taxable_whats_not.pdf .

Happy new years everyone. It seems like here there is a lot of fees are going up when it comes to provincial stuff such as income taxes and even various things like pubic transportation getting more expensive. Of course this has a lot of people saying how that isn’t good for the economy and such. One thing that this made me think of is the public transportation price and how I remember a quote before of someone saying compared to a car you are getting a bargain for what you pay. Therefore the small increase shouldn’t matter much.

It made me think because if you are trying to lure people into using it more from a financial point of view isn’t it better to make it a lot cheaper as opposed to just a little? I know the argument is usually that people are willing to pay so many dollars for another thing anyways so you would think they shouldn’t be apprehensive if you price it similar except a bit cheaper. I personally think that only really works if what you offer is in a sense exactly the same thing. Example, people that run a barber shop where if everyone else is charging $10 per cut then realistically you can say you can undercut it by just a little. However, saying like because people are willing to pay $12 to watch one movie in the theatres means that people should be contempt to pay $10 to order one movie on their TV as it is a bargain in comparison doesn’t work the same I think.

I would be inclined to say there you would need to make it a lot cheaper as it is not the same. Either way guess people will have to adapt to the increases since these are more of an essential service of sort as opposed a non essential.

It’s almost tax time already again and one topic that I have been hearing about lately were people that were talking about how much extra income they made either from a part time job or a business that they were doing on the side. That then sparked a conversation how it’s a lot better to have a part time business if you are looking to create some extra income on the side as you can get better tax benefits that way.

The number one reasoning to not do it was that people expressed that a business is simply too expensive to start and operate. When asked for examples they would reference large companies and how it sounds like a pain have to have to manage such workloads if you were trying to do everything yourself. Basically, it’s more like another full time job.

My first thought that was this must be a very stereotypical way of thinking where just because you see the word “business” that it must mean you have say employees or a large storefront to sell goods or services. I think instead the mindest should be that a business is just more along the lines of finding something where you are your own boss and would need to take full accountability for everything. In that sense, even something as simple as consulting or tutoring can be a part time business opportunity.

Thinking about it like that, in the long run does it sound more appealing to be say a part time language tutor by being employed by someone or you setting your own hours and appointments as see fit to your own schedules? In my view, putting the extra effort to make it a business of your own instead will probably generate more benefits for you in the end as long as you have the work ethic for it.

Funny situation today as I went back to a restaurant to get a receipt for a transaction that occurred yesterday. The one they gave me had no details such as what was ordered and the total taxes. Instead, it just had the total cost and form of payment used.

At first the workers were saying that they couldn’t give me a receipt for the previous day. Then the owner came out and said that I must be using it for business write offs. Funny thing was he then told the staff to just give me any receipt that came close to what I ordered yesterday. Since they couldn’t locate it quickly the owner just gave me like three receipts that almost totaled the same amount.

These are apparently from other customers that simply left their receipts behind. Literally, he was willing to just give me like a handful of them. Kind of interesting I thought as when you think about it someone could just grab receipts like these that people leave behind and use it for their own write-offs.

So here it looks like soon there will be an introduction of a new tax. Basically, here we have different taxes for different things. Depending on what you buy you would be charge the appropriate taxes. Instead, now we are going to be universally taxed on everything using this new one rate system.

That means a lot of things are going to be more expensive. For example, normally for services like a consulting business you would only charge people one tax of like 5%. For goods like a new TV people would get charged the 5% plus another 7%. Everything now will be charged a 12% rate.

I suppose if you are self employed this can benefit you in many ways as you can now write off the taxes on everything. That’s the only real way that I can think to take advantage of the situation. Other then that, if you intend to make a large purchase that normally only requires one small tax you might want to consider buying it before the new rules come into play.