Cross-Border Electricity Supplier Development Or Will Encounter High Altitude Airflow

Developing or encountering high altitude airflow.

In the past month, an industry concern is importing the spread of B2C cross-border e-commerce.

"After the Spring Festival, suddenly it feels like a storm. Our winter is coming."

A person who specializes in importing B2C cross-border electricity providers told reporters that all kinds of information channels have shown that the policy of importing cross-border electricity providers in the mode of "bonded + mail" has been reversed.

From the previous explicit encouragement, it became a restriction and restriction.

A number of people close to the decision-making process and practitioners confirmed this to reporters.

Some of these people took part in the previous research. Some of them did not participate, but they got feedback gradually through their reliable channels. The new cross-border electricity supplier, led by the Ministry of finance, the Ministry of Commerce and the General Administration of customs, has been approved by the State Council in principle. Some details are still being discussed and will be landed in early April.

In addition to the complete abolition of the preferential tax policies in the pre tax field, which is exempt from the postal tax within 50 yuan, some people in the industry are worried about how the ministries and commissions are trying to determine the "positive list".

This is regarded as the vital gate for the development of China's cross-border electricity supplier industry.

The reasons behind the new deal are complex.

On the one hand, it is the huge industrial development potential brought about by the consumer oriented innovative business model that has swept the globe; on the other hand, it is the regulatory authorities such as customs and other departments, facing the regulatory problem of fragmented parcel with geometric growth.

Those who have responded to the government's call for "sunshine" import cross-border B2C electricity providers are facing the embarrassment of riding a tiger.

Regulatory difficulties in the import of B2C

The focus of the new policy change is, in short, to encourage all types of cross-border electricity providers from the past to pform cross-border electricity suppliers to cross border export electricity providers and promote the B2B role in the real economy. At the same time, the cross-border import B2C mode is also restricted, that is, cross border import electricity suppliers of bonded consumer goods.

Jingdong, Tmall international and NetEase koala, which are familiar to Chinese consumers, are typical representatives of the latter.

In order to guide overseas consumption, Gao Hucheng, Minister of Commerce, said during the two sessions that the number of duty-free shops will increase this year and that some imports will be imported.

Study and choose the plan.

But it is worth noting that Gao tiger did not mention cross-border electricity suppliers.

Prior to the late February, the new China Office press conference, he pointed out that "we have to develop cross-border e-commerce, to achieve without going out can shop abroad, which is also a focus of our work this year."

What is the reason for the sudden change of wind direction?

The most important reason for this policy change is that the existing regulatory force has been unable to cope with the geometric growth of fragmented packages accompanying the development of the B2C industry.

In January 8, 2016, the new office of the State Council held a new comprehensive e-business pilot area.

Zhang Ji, Assistant Minister of Commerce, said that the main body of cross-border e-commerce development is clear, B2B is the main body, B2C is complementary.

B2C will grow, but not far away.

The real need to strengthen is the B2B, so the cross-border e-commerce should focus on the development of B2B, which is in line with the needs of our foreign trade steady growth and structure adjustment, and also helps to reduce the cost of supervision and improve the efficiency of customs clearance.

Zhang Ji quoted customs data that through the statistics of 7 cities to carry out the cross-border retail business, the export and import scale of the cross-border e-commerce B2C model in the month of 2015 was 7 billion 900 million yuan (the same below) and 14 billion 500 million yuan, respectively.

The export of B2C in this way is 7 billion 880 million yuan, and there are 148 million checklists in 23 major cities. At the same time, statistics on 7 pilot cities show that the import scale is 2 billion 230 million dollars, and the total number of inspection and release lists is 95 million 988 thousand and 900.

"This is fragmented. There are many lists, but the amount is limited.

Hundreds of millions of bills are only 20 billion dollars. If the scale of import B2C is bigger and bigger, our regulatory cost will be very high, and it is also very difficult to regulate.

He said.

Zhao Ping, a researcher at the China Council for the promotion of trade research, who has participated in the drafting of a number of national cross-border electricity business policies and has studied many cross border e-commerce platforms, also witnessed this point.

The main challenge of customs is how to supervise the problem of counterfeiting, intellectual property and price regulation brought by customs clearance through small packages.

Because there were ten thousand pieces in the past.

It only corresponds to a customs declaration, and now every pair of shoes may correspond to a customs declaration.

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Zhao Ping said that in the past few years, customs in some regions have adopted a "single window" and other trade facilitation measures, such as electronic declaration platform, logistics, inspection and quarantine, and other customs clearance procedures.

However, the challenge is still enormous.

The existing technology has been able to tell whether the conveyor belt is passed on the customs declaration list (for example, a pair of shoes instead of a garment).

But the conveyor belt is unable to distinguish the price of the goods.

"If a customs declaration company writes a value of 200 yuan for shoes valued at 20 thousand yuan, it is difficult for the machine to detect tax evasion, only manual selection.

But where is there so much manpower to check? "She said.

China's cross-border e-commerce platform exports accounted for roughly 85%, while cross-border import electricity providers accounted for only 15%.

Among them, the cross-border import B2C mode only accounts for less than 20% of the total cross-border imports.

On the surface, the total size of cross-border B2C imports is very limited, but there is great potential in this area. The growth rate reached more than 42% in the first half of 2015.

"I think what policymakers worry about is not the size of the current scale, but the regulatory challenges brought about by the explosive scale of the future.

After all, compared with the hundreds of millions of small bills, the customs's manpower is far from comparable.

Zhao Ping said.

Other big environmental factors also urge policymakers to make changes in policy direction.

Xiao Feng, vice president of Alibaba, has participated in the investigation of cross-border e-commerce platform many times.

He told our reporter that the director of foreign trade has always attached great importance to the development of new formats. After the start of the comprehensive e-commerce pilot in Hangzhou, almost every month, people will come to investigate the progress and report upward.

In the decision-making process, the existing macroeconomic situation, the impact of B2C cross-border import electricity suppliers on fair trade and the impact on existing investment are also important considerations.

"Generally speaking, the international practice is wide and strict. That is to say, the export control is looser and the import control is stricter."

Xiao Feng said.

According to the survey conducted by the Ministry of Commerce, because of cross-border import of electricity suppliers, foreign goods can go directly to the customs. Some enterprises that originally set up trading companies in China's coastal areas have begun to withdraw. These signals have caused some unrest.

The overall decline in export data caused by the sluggish external demand has also begun to tilt the policy towards exports.

Import and export double down in 2015 has been extended to the first quarter of this year.

In the first 2 months of 2016, the total value of China's imports and exports was 3 trillion and 310 billion yuan, down 12.6% from the same period last year.

Among them, exports dropped by 13.1% and imports dropped by 11.8%.

How can trade and taxation return to equity?

Since the birth of the cross-border electricity supplier B2C mode, there has been controversy over fair trade and grey areas.

B2C electricity supplier itself is centered on consumers, with the help of the Internet's "long tail theory", one of the classic advanced business models.

Take the international giant Amazon's early book sales model as an example. In the last century, the Internet developed rapidly, and Amazon took only 7 years to reach the 130 largest sale of Barnes&Noble, the largest chain bookstore in the United States.

Once this mode enters the cross-border field, it faces the common regulatory blindness of customs, quality inspection, food safety, inspection and quarantine.

In fact, from the very beginning, most cross-border electricity providers were by way of mail to bypass regulation.

Under the traditional mode of supervision, the purchase and purchase of goods through the small package are generally equivalent to personal postal items and the collection of postal tax.

When the scale of "Hai Tao" is not obvious, it is generally believed that this part of the tax can be ignored.

The postal tax is the abbreviation for the import tax on luggage and postal articles, and it is the import tax imposed by the Customs on incoming passengers' luggage and personal postal articles.

Before September 1, 2010, China had a tax allowance of 500 yuan for personal mail items.

Since 2010, the scale of underground private purchasing or importing cross-border electricity suppliers has been increasing. The scale of tax that may be missed has aroused the concern of Chinese regulators.

This reporter received a July 2015 Roland Begg study on cross-border electricity providers, indicating that China's cross-border import B2C real scale, the growth rate is amazing.

From 2010 to 2014, the total annual growth rate of cross-border electricity imports reached 86%.

The main driving force is: consumers' demand for more high-quality, diversified products, tax preferences, the gradual penetration of mobile Internet, and the regulatory blindness of personal mail.

According to the Announcement No. forty-third issued by the General Administration of customs, after September 1, 2010, the quota of "postal tax" has been reduced to 50 yuan.

Customs officials still told reporters that even with the reduction of the quota, the regulatory challenges faced by more and more fragmented cross-border packages remain enormous.

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As a result, since 2013, the state has begun to supervise the cross-border import electricity providers in a "sunshine" way.

On the one hand, it is hoped to pfer Chinese consumption overseas to China; on the other hand, it also hopes to find a reasonable way to levy taxes on the past "gray areas" while innovating the format space.

From the point of view of cross-border import of electricity business, from 2014 to 2015, the cross-border trade dividend has been released at the policy level.

Since 2014, the General Administration of Customs has issued a number of policy documents for importing retail electricity suppliers in the pilot cities for cross-border electric business which it has approved in succession. In March 2014, the General Administration of Customs issued a regulation on the "bonded import" mode in the notice.

Under this mode, the importing electricity supplier can purchase bulk goods in advance by sea / air way, and deliver the goods to the bonded warehouses in the bonded area tax-free. After receiving the consumer orders, the goods will be shipped directly from the bonded warehouse after customs inspection.

Only a relatively low postal tax is payable on the warehouse.

In August 2014, the Announcement No. 56 clarified the customs's supervision ideas on the import of cross-border electricity providers. The 57 announcement gave the legal identity of the bonded imports of online shopping, that is, 1210 regulatory code, the full name "bonded cross-border e-commerce", or "bonded e-commerce".

An electric business insider told our reporter that this is the first practice of the Chinese government in global supervision.

With the encouragement of this policy, quite a lot of investors and start-ups began to enter the field of cross-border import B2C.

To a certain extent, this brings some taxes back.

The above electricity providers provided a set of customs related data to our reporter. In 2015, the total scale of cross-border import bonded was 17 billion 600 million, and the tax revenue was 1 billion 400 million.

According to incomplete statistics, last year Hai Tao 300 billion scale, outbound tourism shopping 1 trillion and 500 billion, because customs inspection rate is low, postal tax payment amount is very small.

However, these reflux taxes can not prevent traditional importing enterprises from denouncing unfair B2C imports.

The general view is that in the process of importing goods, traditional enterprises mainly collect tariffs, excise taxes and consumption tax on luxury goods.

And import electricity suppliers impose a postal tax.

At present, most of the overseas products purchased by domestic consumers are 10% of the postal tax rate, which is relatively low.

However, the electricity business insider told our reporter that the tax rate is not objective in a single way, because the cross border import electricity supplier is not the same as the general import tax base.

The general trade tax base is CIF CIF (that is, ex factory price + freight), while the cross border electricity supplier tax base is the actual paction price. According to the 43 samples of internal sampling (such as cosmetics, baby seats, health products, etc.), most of them are postal tax rates higher than the general trade tax rate.

He gave an example to reporters: a Estee Lauder flower eye shadow (5 color) with a CIF value of 55 yuan, if the general tax rate is 83.86% through general trade, then the tax amount will be 46.12 yuan; but if through the cross-border e-commerce platform, the tax base is collected at the selling price of 431 yuan, the duty rate of the postal tax is 50%, and the final tax amount is 215.5 yuan, much higher than that of general trade.

But the eye shadow may be priced at 520 yuan on the counter.

Among them, from the price of 55 to the price of 520, most of the difference comes from the cost of logistics, as well as brand discriminatory pricing of Chinese market.

Even so, the entire import cross-border electricity supplier industry is also expected to have a gradual return to the general trade in the cross-border trade electricity supplier, but in terms of the scope and type of the levy, we still think the new version is too harsh.

The electricity supplier mentioned in the policy opinion submitted to the government mentioned that the "New Deal" is a single limit of 2000 yuan.

According to China's existing policies, the value limit of individual consumer goods when residents enter the country is 5000 yuan, while the limit of shopping in Islands duty-free shops is 8000 yuan.

Compared with the above standards, the former is obviously low.

In addition, he believes that, in accordance with the relevant provisions of the customs regulations, even in general trade, the goods with a tariff of less than 50 yuan, including customs duties, import value-added tax and consumption tax, are entitled to exemption from preferential treatment.

Internationally, the existence of tax allowance is also a common practice. The tax exemption in many countries is much higher than that in our country and there is an upward trend.

From these two points of view, the abolition of the cross border import allowance is inconsistent with the common practice at home and abroad.

In the eyes of those close to the decision making process, no matter how the details are implemented, it will be a general trend to reduce customs duties and raise postal tax, reduce profit margins in the gray area and guide cross-border B2B in the future.

Import business is in a dilemma

For those companies that have experienced the "bonus period of industrial policy" and have invested heavily in building cross-border import platforms, they are now in a dilemma.

Since October 2014, people from all walks of life have been importing electricity providers. Internet giants such as Jingdong and NetEase have promoted the offshore outsourcing sector to an important strategic position. Venture companies have stepped up the pace of financing, running on the front line, such as honey buds, ocean terminals, and Xiaohong books have gone to the C million dollar level financing stage.

A number of cross border importing electricity providers who do not want to be named have told our reporter that in the early days of the government's call, they invested a lot of money to build intelligent warehouses, factories and logistics platforms. Some enterprises had faced several rounds of venture capital, and now they are faced with policy changes. Does this mean that these investments will become sunk costs?

What worries the whole industry is not always the expected tax rate adjustment, but the positive list problem.

This is the gate to decide the future development of the industry.

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In the past direction of reform, the outside world has been expected to implement negative list management for cross-border electricity providers, for example, in the field of food and drug supervision, which lists the categories that can not be sold through the imported electronic business platform, and other categories can be sold.

If we use the positive list of hearsay, it is likely to limit the development of the industry.

The industry insiders explained to our reporter that the biggest advantage of cross-border electricity providers is to inform consumers of the real product information, so that some domestic temporarily lacking high-quality foreign goods can quickly meet consumer demand, and the means of e-commerce can also be traced to the whole process.

He said that the B2C mode is centered on the individual needs of consumers.

"For example, according to the big category, it can be divided into cosmetics and facial cleanser, but customers' needs include niche products such as hair products and washing baby butts. How should we classify them?"

He pointed out that if the list is managed according to the positive list, more than 90% of the commodities will be on the downline. At present, most of the brands that are stationed in the import business platform will have to withdraw from the Chinese market.

The trouble is that more goods have not even entered the Chinese market.

In accordance with the management of goods, we need to get import licenses from multiple departments, including the Ministry of Commerce in charge of import quotas, the food and Drug Administration in charge of food safety, and the General Administration of quality supervision, inspection and quarantine.

Consumers, as the direct importing body, do not have the conditions to handle relevant licenses at all.

"More importantly, many commodities permit for a long time, high cost, and many products have different standards at home and abroad. The domestic market simply can not buy these items, which is why the Chinese people want to sea the basic reason.

If all these require a permit to import, it will take at least six to two years before landing. "

He said.

On the whole, he wrote to the government's policy recommendations that "sunshine" cross-border electricity providers generally believe that the positive list management mode will lead to more than 90% cross-border goods withdrawal, a large number of goods will return to the postal channel, a large number of parks and facilities are idle and wasted, and water users and "ash pass" will gain more arbitrage space.

In particular, they were disturbed that such a big policy change did not seek the views of these enterprises in the early stage.

"Until I learned that the Customs General Administration is developing the national version monitoring system in full swing. The trial run at the end of March to support the implementation of the new deal in April has found that the policy is really coming."

The source at the beginning of this article told reporters.

In mid March, some industries and upstream and downstream enterprises were convened by the customs system and participated in the investigation of "cross border electricity supplier price investigation work plan" in Guangzhou, Hangzhou and other places.

In the list of research questions that journalists get, they include: the selling mode of electronic business, including stock preparation, logistics, customs clearance, pricing policy of online retail price of cross-border electric goods, and whether online retail price includes tax.

If there is a tax sale, how to declare the duty paid price and other technical details to the customs.

Judging from the feelings of the participants, they seem to be pointing to the new rumors before.

Now, though unable to get accurate information, these anxious importing providers have to be prepared to hedge against the sudden impact of the new deal.

For example, the 2000 yuan or more single piece of light extravagant goods, used to be Hai Tao purchasing, as well as China's overseas shopping favorite high value goods, import cross-border e-commerce platform to attract the main products of consumer reflux.

This reporter learned from the industry that at present, the unit price of selected items of over 30% of the electronic business platform exceeds 2000 yuan.

In the past, such commodities could be specially dealt with in taxation, but after tax reform, they would face not only the risk of larger tax changes, such as raising taxes in large quantities, but might even not be able to continue to sell.

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"We are meeting every day to adjust technical ports for possible new policies."

The electricity supplier said.

"Some platforms are making great progress every day, especially for light luxury goods with more than 2000 yuan per unit.

Zhao Ping pointed out to reporters that it is not suitable for the supervision of imported B2C cross-border electricity providers to use the positive list.

The supervision of the positive list is very difficult. If the list is too short, it will not only restrict the development of the industry, nor meet the needs of domestic consumption upgrading, but also can not achieve the purpose of attracting overseas consumption reflux.

She believes that the way of negative list is more suitable for creating a good business environment.

"Maintaining the continuity and stability of policies is crucial to the development of the industry."

Zhao Ping said.