France wants e-commerce tax

If the French government get their way, the Hexagon will soon introduce a tax on e-commerce. Products would become 1 to 2 % more expensive, depending on the distance of the last delivery.

No more free deliveries

The tax aims to revitalise trade in city centres and to protect smaller businesses. At first, the tax was suggested to be 50 cent per kilometre the package travelled, but instead a proportional tax was proposed – ranging from 1 % of the purchase price (in case the distance between the last storage warehouse and the delivery address is shorter than 50 kilometres) to 2% (if said distance is larger than 80 kilometres). However, there is a minimum of one euro in case of short deliveries or small packages. If someone in Paris orders a 1000 euro through Amazon, the tax for delivering it from the nearest warehouse in Lille would be 20 euro, French newspaper Le Figaro calculated. 

The French retail sector is not amused, fearing that consumers will pay the bills and that free deliveries will become impossible. Moreover, the French government has not succeeded in targeting foreign large e-commerce companies: the new tax would hit French companies equally hard. The retailers now put their faith in the Assemblée Nationale, who still has to agree to the tax before it passes into law.