TRS - record keeping of claims

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  PissLUR on 27/12/2013 - 18:50

  good questions. I dont think there is any record keeping of claims at all.

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  Prettyinpink on 27/12/2013 - 19:43

  1) What passport are you flying out & in with? I always intentionally fly with a non-Austalian passport because the idea is that you are not returning with the goods. I know people who have had to repay the tax when they brought the claimed item back into Australia. Therefore, they must have a record of claims. The tax they were refunded was very high - thousands - so they may not care about lower figures.

  2) Depending on the service person you get sometimes they call the store to validate the purchase but from my experience that is only from higher priced items.
  TRS stamps your receipt after you claim the tax.

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    Flying Ace on 27/12/2013 - 21:48

    You only have to (re)pay the tax if the item is (still) over $1000 in value when you (re)enter the country.

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    devpress on 27/12/2013 - 23:08

    -1

    1) Well if Customs somehow found out that you've brought back in items you've declared on the outbound flight, then of course they can charge you GST (and a penalty if you didn't declare) on the goods.

    But what I'm asking in essence is what system or method Customs has in-place to do this (apart from intuition / pure luck / guesswork). I have read somewhere that Customs do record into their systems goods that are claimed against passport #s.

    2) Not in my experience - I have claimed on goods up to $9000 without the Customs officer calling the store. Calling the store to authenticate the purchase isn't always possible - e.g. when travelling outside of business hours as the store is unlikely to be open

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      Prettyinpink on 31/12/2013 - 08:30

      1) Well obviously it is connected to your passport number…… They also enter the receipt number so you would need a different receipt number.

      2) 9000 on multiple goods or individual goods? That is not really that much. I've been in lines where people claim 15k, 20k even one time 150k for individual handbags. Think about jewellery and watches too. Those items they check with the stores or at least their supervisor.
      I know stores that reprint receipts with later dates for certain customers or even hand write them with blank dates. As for changing an already printed receipt, I don't know if you could forge it. I don't see why not. The only risk would be them calling the store I guess. There are so many people in the line on certain flights they don't even check the items. I've had people make me remove every shoe to ensure they were pairs. I've also had people not even want to see the items and barely looked that they even matched the receipt descriptions.

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  meumax on 31/12/2013 - 08:09

  Not just modifying the date, but what about altering the amount so you get a bigger refund than you were entitled to?

  I think it's an honesty system and they have no way to check anything but I'm not game to try it given they record your passport no. When processing a claim.