Cat401
Active VIP Member
There could be some truth to this.....here is a clip taken from the Globe & Mail.....
VANCOUVER — Attention shoppers. If you are a B.C. resident who recently purchased a $30 toaster at a Costco store in Alberta and didn't send Victoria a cheque for the $2.10 in sales tax you avoided at home, please be advised the government is on to you.
And it is determined to get its money.
... the government is demanding that the giant retail discount chain help nail the crooks by turning over the names and addresses of all its B.C. members who have shopped at its Alberta stores in the past several years.
Rick Thorpe, the often-abrasive Minister of Small Business and Revenue, has also requested details on any Internet purchases in which B.C. customers -- who pay a 7 per cent provincial sales tax at home -- picked up their items in Alberta.
..."Tell me, is the B.C. government going to start issuing refund cheques to people from Alberta who purchase goods and pay sales tax in B.C.? Not likely. But if you're going to start erecting walls around your province, it has to work both ways.
...The bigger issue may be its decision to order Costco to turn over confidential client information. While B.C. residents living along the province's eastern border cross into Alberta to shop at any number of stores, the government has focused on Costco because it is a membership-based chain and, as a result, has a paper trail of client transactions.
...Mr. Thorpe (Minister responsible), who has often railed against interprovincial trade barriers, was apparently too busy to talk with the media, so he had assistant Theresa Lumsdon relay three points in response to general inquiries about the matter: 1) "because the issue is before the courts the ministry can't comment on the privacy issue;" 2) "the whole initiative is standard operating procedure;" 3) "B.C. retailers along the B.C./Alberta border have been hurting and have been asking for this."
...John Winter, president and chief executive officer of the government-friendly B.C. Chamber of Commerce, said he is perplexed by the Liberals' move.
"It seems particularly vindictive to me," said Mr. Winter. "People who go shopping have an expectation of privacy. I just think that for what they might possibly be getting in return through this measure the government is using up an awful lot of political capital. It really makes no sense."
VANCOUVER — Attention shoppers. If you are a B.C. resident who recently purchased a $30 toaster at a Costco store in Alberta and didn't send Victoria a cheque for the $2.10 in sales tax you avoided at home, please be advised the government is on to you.
And it is determined to get its money.
... the government is demanding that the giant retail discount chain help nail the crooks by turning over the names and addresses of all its B.C. members who have shopped at its Alberta stores in the past several years.
Rick Thorpe, the often-abrasive Minister of Small Business and Revenue, has also requested details on any Internet purchases in which B.C. customers -- who pay a 7 per cent provincial sales tax at home -- picked up their items in Alberta.
..."Tell me, is the B.C. government going to start issuing refund cheques to people from Alberta who purchase goods and pay sales tax in B.C.? Not likely. But if you're going to start erecting walls around your province, it has to work both ways.
...The bigger issue may be its decision to order Costco to turn over confidential client information. While B.C. residents living along the province's eastern border cross into Alberta to shop at any number of stores, the government has focused on Costco because it is a membership-based chain and, as a result, has a paper trail of client transactions.
...Mr. Thorpe (Minister responsible), who has often railed against interprovincial trade barriers, was apparently too busy to talk with the media, so he had assistant Theresa Lumsdon relay three points in response to general inquiries about the matter: 1) "because the issue is before the courts the ministry can't comment on the privacy issue;" 2) "the whole initiative is standard operating procedure;" 3) "B.C. retailers along the B.C./Alberta border have been hurting and have been asking for this."
...John Winter, president and chief executive officer of the government-friendly B.C. Chamber of Commerce, said he is perplexed by the Liberals' move.
"It seems particularly vindictive to me," said Mr. Winter. "People who go shopping have an expectation of privacy. I just think that for what they might possibly be getting in return through this measure the government is using up an awful lot of political capital. It really makes no sense."
