Guild Wars 2

About a week ago I purchased gems and there was no Tax. Now after this new billing system there is a Sales Tax.

As far as I know my area doesn’t have an internet Sales Tax, so… What happened? This tax covers the entire US now?

I would appreciate a bit more clarification on that.

Well it’s not national, as in the US, yet. However that doesn’t mean states can’t pass laws to implement one themselves, see “Amazon Tax”. You’re going to have to check to see if your state now has one as of Dec 1st.

Now a cursory look I don’t see any new internet sales tax implemented. Maybe you were getting away without paying before and now with the new system they make sure it’s out of your pocket and not their’s. Or the new system is busted.

So what state?

Yeah, getting the same in Europe. Can’t recall this Tax before. Probably their new payment system provider pocketing some extra money. It does say that the total is going to be €50 even though it lists a €10 Tax with it at the Confirm screen though. Oh well, doesn’t matter, I only receive a “failed” error message when trying to give ArenaNet some money. Why in the world they wanted to change to this new provider is beyond me, they must be losing money on it. I basically decided to not buy Gems after all because of this Tax showing up and the fact that it just “failed” three times in a row.

Europe’s VAT was always included in the price. The US laws regarding online transactions do vary. Some laws require a company to have a physical presence in the state before taxes can be charged. Some companies charge tax regardless, because they’re good about reporting everything properly.

Adding sales tax (or finally enforcing it) with no prior explanation or modicum of context isn’t nice. That’s a good deterrent for people not to buy directly from the store and go for gem cards instead. It could now be cheaper to buy a 2,000 gem card for 30 bucks from a well know game cards site (or from a physical store). Or not buy anything at all.

Colorado, and there is no Internet Sales Tax here, that I’m aware of. But this didn’t happen until they switched the billing.

If there is a reason for it, I would like to know. Its a little strange that GW2 gems are the only internet purchase I see a sales tax on.

aliengmr.7381:

Colorado, and there is no Internet Sales Tax here, that I’m aware of. But this didn’t happen until they switched the billing.

If there is a reason for it, I would like to know. Its a little strange that GW2 gems are the only internet purchase I see a sales tax on.

Well, the Government of Colorado says you may pay internet sales tax when purchasing, or you may not. But, tax is owed either way.

http://www.colorado.gov/cs/Satellite/Revenue/REVX/1187858027372

Make of it what you will.

That’s “use tax” and pretty much every state has that kind of self reporting of mail order goods. Not really enforceable due to the lack of ability to track it but I agree that “Lucy got some ’splainin to do!” if they are collecting taxes that don’t need to be.