New Tax for Using Netflix and Spotify: The Govt. of the province of Buenos Aires will begin to apply a tax from April

It will apply to all foreign streaming services. The province of Buenos Aires will begin to collect Value-added tax. It was already in force since the beginning of the year in the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires and 8 other provinces.

The Government of the province of Buenos Aires will begin to apply a tax on streaming services from April . In this way, you will feel a 2% increase in the bills of Netflix and Spotify , among other platforms.

It is about the collection of Gross Income from digital services offered by foreign companies, which had been resolved during the administration of María Eugenia Vidal , but which the former governor did not apply after suffering the electoral defeat in 2019. Upon assuming Axel Kicillof , The measure was supposed to take effect from January 1, 2020, however it was postponed for four months for operational reasons, ARBA indicated at the time. By the time it should have come into effect, the pandemic and restrictive measures occurred, so the Buenos Aires Executive decided to postpone it indefinitely until yesterday the date of the collection was finally announced.

A similar situation arose in the City of Buenos Aires , but it began to be charged at the beginning of 2021. This was one of the arguments used by the head of ARBA, Cristian Girard , to justify the new tax on streaming services that must be paid. the Buenos Aires people. “The City of Buenos Aires had it in force, so we decided to do it simultaneously so that there is no inequality. Give equal treatment also to companies located in Argentina, because the clients of these companies do pay Gross Income, but those that provide services from abroad do not “, argued the provincial official who added: “We do not want to create a disincentive to national production, on the contrary, we want to create incentives to produce locally.”

In addition to Capital and now the Province of Buenos Aires, the tax on digital services is also charged in Córdoba, Salta, San Juan, Mendoza, Tucumán, Jujuy, Río Negro, and La Pampa.

“In Argentina, they have been talking about tax harmonization, which fundamentally aims at not generating asymmetries or inequalities in the collection of taxes in relation to the agents who pay them,” Girard said.

The new tribute will be reflected in the credit card statements for March. In that sense, the head of ARBA differed from the City by stating that the application will be given “one month later” than in the Federal Capital.

In Argentina, the Netflix rate, like that of other foreign streaming services, is subject to the following taxes: Value added tax (VAT) of 21%; COUNTRY tax , 8%; and Tax by Resolution 4815/2020 (advance income tax) of 35 percent. In most cases, the banks through which the payment is made add the taxes to the net membership amount (it appears as a separate charge on the account or card statement).

Netflix in particular raised the price of its plans in early February. “We understand that people have more entertainment options than ever before and that is why we are committed to continuing to improve the experience for our members. We change our prices, which have remained the same for the last year, so that we can continue to offer more variety of series and films and new films every week. As always, we offer different plan options, ranging from $ 279 per month, so that people can choose the price that best suits their budget, “they said weeks ago from Netflix before consulting Infobae .

With the new Gross Income tax, the basic Netflix service will have an additional cost of $ 5.58, the standard plan $ 9.18 and the premium of $ 13.38. In the case of Spotify, the individual plan will have an additional value of $ 2.78 and the duo plan $ 3.58.

In addition to Netflix and Spotify, the new measure will impact other streaming services such as Itunes, Google Play, YouTube, Tinder, and social media advertising services such as Facebook and Twitter.