Anyone here who wants to buy my Game?

[Cmdrcain]

ORIGINAL: wodin

Matrix are selling their games at prices which normally include VAT when you buy them from a shop.

Did MAtrix research how much games are sold for in shops in the UK i.e 29.99 upto 39.99 and then forget that the VAT is already added to these prices?

Really your games, to not P~~S so many people off should be sold for either 29.99 upto £39.99 with VAT already included. This I feel is the main gripe. No one in the UK has ever gone in to a shop bought a game with a price sticker of 39.99 and then be charged more at the counter. Doesnt happen.

Yes your games are worth the extra money but no one likes to feel they have been cheated.

In USA, games are usually out at S39.99 and Upwards more like 59.99 dollars, on average and up, after a couple of YEARS some popular games are sold simply for 9.99 in a CD case, no box, no manuel (its electronic) but that after like
Age of Empires had been out and been selling at list price for quite some time.

Fresh, new, games don't go for below 39.99-69.99 in USA

Don't have conversion handy to convert it into pounds, but the point is New games don't come out cheap, we would like em cheap but they don't

I'd be interested in titles of games you thnk are low priced, it could be the games are what we pay here 9.99 to 19.99 for OLDER games like Doom, Age of Empirs, Civilization II, the games considered well "used" and replaced on shelves by like Civilization III so the stuff thats older thats been sold at list for a couple years is maybe sold in Britain at a lower price too with VAT added...in Jewel case only, no box.

Your low priced software likely is what we pay 9.99-19.99 for, older , now discounted versions of a game line.

Got some Title names?

[Cmdrcain]

ORIGINAL: Hertston


VAT is actually a very equitable tax. It is not charged on "essentials" such as (uncooked) food and water supplies. In the UK at least it is charged at a much reduced rate on electricity and gas supplies to domestic customers. Unlike income tax, you can in that respect "choose" whether you pay it or not. I only mention all this at the risk of boring everybody stupid because there is a school, with which I have some sympathy, who believe VAT at an increased rate should actually replace income tax, and any local equivalents, in it's entirety. That isn't just a "Euro" thing either... it's just as applicable to the US or anywhere else.

VAT doesn't sound any different from the STATE sales taxes we pay,
those sales taxes have uncooked food exemptions too, and a few other exemptions like I believe Medicial.

But Buy a car, A meal in resturant, etc you pay sales tax but ours is less 6-7 pct through it used be far less, in my stat also each area can vote in a local added sales tax like 1 pct more to pay for say building extra [:D]Jails[:D]

So even within some states the "sales tax" can vary from the Normal state sales tax.

Mind you we have other taxes, some states have state income taxes on top of our Federal sales tax and we pay Gas tax on buying gas plus any other taxes are applied to that price so its a tax on a tax on a tax sometimes...

The Forefathers are spinning in their graves I'm sure [:D]

Lets face it people, no matter where you live, you can be sure theres taxes..

[8|]

[Belisarius]

ORIGINAL: Hertston

ORIGINAL: Belisarius

and get this; there are EXTRA taxes on alcohol, gasoline, and other such "luxuries"...

Yup, so do we on alcohol, tobacco and gasoline. The tobacco tax in particular is so high, it's estimated something like a third of cigarettes smoked here are either bought in abroad (France or Spain, usually) or smuggled in. It's the hypocrisy that's most annoying - the government always trying to balance persuading people to quit (allegedly) against billions in revenue (certainly). All it results in is nobody giving up, and the poor (smoking levels are much higher in the lowest earnings groups) getting poorer.

Yep, uh-huh, forgot about the tobacco. I do think however that it's not as high as in the UK... but we have a similar "problem" with the alchohol. Prices are 30-50% lower on hard liquor (40% by volume) in Denmark and Finland, even less in Germany and Estonia. And with everyone being EU members and the new duty free quotas, you get the picture. Domestic booze sales plummet since January, but we drink more. Heh. Free market powers at work. You can't hold it back by taxing the hell out of it.

[ravinhood]

I think we need another revolution and a tea party and this time it will be a world tea party. heh I'm really gettin sick n tired of taxes on this and taxes on that and taxing booze and cigarettes like 3x to 4x it's acutal price. You know if we didn't have taxes we wouldn't have welfare and armies, that means two things, people would "have" to work and nobody could goto war cause there would be no funds to support it.

When our government imposed "income tax" it was only suppose to be for the war effort, and that seemed reasonable, but, boy, when they saw all that extra money they were getting from us, they decides to leave it in law and now they have carpet baggers that come take everything you got if you don't pay it.

And the one thing that really bugs me, if I buy a car brand new, I pay tax on it, then if I sell the car the person that buys it has to pay another tax on it, and if that person sells the car the next person has to pay tax on it, that's the most rediculous thing I ever heard, an item should only be taxable ONCE and only ONCE.

We have another wonderful taxing policy here as well, called capital gains tax, now say you have some stock that makes a large increase in the stock market, you just made a capital gain, and you have to pay tax on that gain, even if the stock drops out of the ceiling later on and you still own it. Do they give you your tax back? lol hell no.

Heh, don't get me started on taxes and taxing, I think it's one big government hand in my pocket myself, I say one tax all year long, call it income, federal or whatever you want to, but, you are only taxed once and one amount and nothing else.

[Didz]

One thing thats really 'pisses me off' in this country at the moment is New Labaa's fetish for Toll Roads.

I mean do they think we're all thick or something?

They claim these new toll roads only exist to ease congestion, then they stick a bloody toll booth on it in order to create a queue.[&:]

I make a point of avoiding using them but its damned hard to do because they make sure that all the signage is carefully configured to con you into going down them instead of sticking to the original route. And when you do, you get fleeced for £2.00 if your in a car or £10 in a van or lorry. Which is taxation pure and simple, you are taxed for using a road for which you have already been taxed to pay for as part of your Road Tax, along with petrol and diesel tax.

So, in effect the government has taken our money built us a road and then charged us for using it, except of course it isn't a new road because there was already a road there in the first place. So in fact they took our money built us a second road we didn't actually need, going to exactly the same place as an existing road and then expect us to pay to use the new road instead of using the old one becuase we're the only idiots stupid enough to pay an extra £2 to go to exactly the same place everyone else is going. Only a twat like Blair could come up with something that draft and expect drivers to be that dumb.

[Golf33]

ORIGINAL: Hertston

Yup, so do we on alcohol, tobacco and gasoline. The tobacco tax in particular is so high, it's estimated something like a third of cigarettes smoked here are either bought in abroad (France or Spain, usually) or smuggled in. It's the hypocrisy that's most annoying - the government always trying to balance persuading people to quit (allegedly) against billions in revenue (certainly). All it results in is nobody giving up, and the poor (smoking levels are much higher in the lowest earnings groups) getting poorer.

Sounds fair enough to me. Smokers cost an enormous amount of money in government-funded healthcare, so it's only fair that duties on cigarettes should offset at least a small proportion of that cost. Personally I'd deny medical treatment for smoking-related complaints to anyone who either started in the last 20 years, and/or failed to quit smoking on being told to do so by a doctor.

Do you think we've strayed far enough from the topic yet?

Regards
33

[Marc von Martial]

ORIGINAL: Golf33

ORIGINAL: Hertston

Yup, so do we on alcohol, tobacco and gasoline. The tobacco tax in particular is so high, it's estimated something like a third of cigarettes smoked here are either bought in abroad (France or Spain, usually) or smuggled in. It's the hypocrisy that's most annoying - the government always trying to balance persuading people to quit (allegedly) against billions in revenue (certainly). All it results in is nobody giving up, and the poor (smoking levels are much higher in the lowest earnings groups) getting poorer.

Sounds fair enough to me. Smokers cost an enormous amount of money in government-funded healthcare, so it's only fair that duties on cigarettes should offset at least a small proportion of that cost. Personally I'd deny medical treatment for smoking-related complaints to anyone who either started in the last 20 years, and/or failed to quit smoking on being told to do so by a doctor.

[8|]

Then tax alcohol, cars, fastfood, candy, snacks, computer games, everything that polutes air, water and soil at least in the same amount then cigarettes. That only would be fair. All of the above cost the health system vast ammounts of money.

Why is is only the smokers that should pay for their unhealthy hobby, huh?

Face it, without all the taxes smokers pay a lot of our nice western countries would be bancrupt allready.

In Germany the tabacco tax is on 2nd rank (tax on fuel is 1st) with 13,8 Mrd. EUR (2002). that´s quite a pretty income.

Actually a non smoker society would costs the health system more money. Non smoking people live (in average) 8 years longer. That is 8 years more with incredible high health costs (your last 10 years suck up around 85% of the total money you need for your personal health care).

[Hartley]

25% on EVERYTHING, with the following exceptions:

books, travels, services and admittance tickets: 6% (level 2)
food: 12% (level 1)

and get this; there are EXTRA taxes on alcohol, gasoline, and other such "luxuries"...

Considering we pay a 28%-33% (and over) income tax to start with, it's fun to see that up to 60% of your net pay ends up in the Government's pockets anyway. w00t. [8|]

Which is why your tennis players all move to Monte Carlo...[;)]

[eg0master]

ORIGINAL: Belisarius

You're welcome to see the VAT system in Sweden (aka "moms");

25% on EVERYTHING, with the following exceptions:

books, travels, services and admittance tickets: 6% (level 2)
food: 12% (level 1)

and get this; there are EXTRA taxes on alcohol, gasoline, and other such "luxuries"...

Considering we pay a 28%-33% (and over) income tax to start with, it's fun to see that up to 60% of your net pay ends up in the Government's pockets anyway. w00t. [8|]

28-33% income tax is only for low and medium income... If your income is larger than about 2400 EUR/month you pay around 50% income tax on all income above 2400 EUR/month...

And the most funny part about the "high income tax" is that if they removed it and increased the income tax for everybody with one or 2 percent it would generate the same income for the goverment... But hey! We live in sweden and if you earn a lot of mony you should pay a higher percentage of the income in taxes...

But to make this better... The company employing you have to pay an employment tax (same if you're self employed but it's called something else) that is about 32% of your income BEFORE taxes...
To explain: If your company wants to spend 1000 EUR to pay you they first have to remove the employment tax. 1000 / 1.32 = 757.58 EUR as salary. Lets say 30% income taxes so you get 757.58 * 0.7 = 530.30 EUR in your pocket (unless this is extra pay and your total salary exceeds the limit for high income tax in which case you get about 375 EUR in your pocket). Add VAT to this and see how much mony actually is payed for something...

[WhoCares]

Just a little notification that they are activly working on the issue (visit the store pages of the various regions):

The VAT information is now a bit more prominent with the full information on the main screen (instead of a popup before, iirc), but still no total incl. VAT before payment, it seems. Maybe another button next to submit to a preview invoice popup after the form is complete?!

The current prices:

$ (1.0) - EURO (1.2) - GBP (1.85)
DL: 69,99 - 66.96 - 45.81
CD: 9.99 - 11.74 - 11.74 [X(]
-----------------------------------------------
Tot. 79.98 78.70 57.55

in $ 79.98 94.44 106.46
(no VAT included!)

(from the VAT information)
For customers from Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, and UK the national VAT rate will be applied. For all other EU customers, the UK VAT rate of 17.5% will be applied.

I would have to check for this one - wouldn't want to pay the 17.5% if we in Germany have 16%...

[Marc von Martial]

ORIGINAL: WhoCares

(no VAT included!)

(from the VAT information)
For customers from Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, and UK the national VAT rate will be applied. For all other EU customers, the UK VAT rate of 17.5% will be applied.

I would have to check for this one - wouldn't want to pay the 17.5% if we in Germany have 16%...

The above states pretty clear that you will be charged your national tax rate if you live in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, or the UK .

Is this really so hard guys?

[WhoCares]

ORIGINAL: Marc Schwanebeck

...
The above states pretty clear that you will be charged your national tax rate if you live in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, or the UK .

Is this really so hard guys?

Yepp, that's why I thought I should check that it really did just that for me, nothing more [;)]

[Didz]

Just to keep everyone up to date.

Several Europeans have reported downloading WiTP successfully form the US site for $82.24 including VAT.

Based on the current EU and UK prices shown this represents a 15% saving on the EU price and an 18% saving on the UK price.

The current price quoted for the EU is 66.96 EUR which at the current exchange rate (Wednesday, July 7, 2004 1 Euro = 1.22940 US Dollar) is $82.32 plus 11.71 EUR VAT ($14.39) TOTAL EU PRICE= 81.35 EUR ($96.71)

The UK price is shown as £45.81 which with VAT @17.5% = £53.82 ($99.93)

Thats a massive 18% saving to UK customers.

So, its definately better to order from the US download site.

[RealChuckB]

ORIGINAL: Marc Schwanebeck

ORIGINAL: WhoCares

(no VAT included!)

(from the VAT information)
For customers from Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, and UK the national VAT rate will be applied. For all other EU customers, the UK VAT rate of 17.5% will be applied.

I would have to check for this one - wouldn't want to pay the 17.5% if we in Germany have 16%...

The above states pretty clear that you will be charged your national tax rate if you live in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, or the UK .

Is this really so hard guys?

Marc,

no, I don't think it's hard to understand, but I have to tell you, that considering all the information we have regarding the contractual constellation between Matrixgames and DR, the description from the store does not really make sense.

You told us, that DR is the reseller of the Matrixgames products in Europe. If that's the case, Matrixgames is actually pretty much out of the whole business of charging Taxes, informing customers regarding S&H etc. because then it is solely DR's responsibility.

DR has a branch in the UK and they are therefore probably "established" in the EU as regard to tax laws. If that's the case, they have to charge the VAT of the country where they are established (UK) for any sale in ANY EU member state. Therefore, every EU customer should have to pay 17,5% VAT. I really don't know why they differentiate between different EU states, it doesn't seem to make any sense ...

Chuck

[WhoCares]

ORIGINAL: WhoCares

ORIGINAL: Marc Schwanebeck

...
The above states pretty clear that you will be charged your national tax rate if you live in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, or the UK .

Is this really so hard guys?

Yepp, that's why I thought I should check that it really did just that for me, nothing more [;)]

...
Order Date: 03-JUL-04
...
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
War In The Pacific 1 Digital Download/CD on Demand Digital River 64.99 EUR
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sub Total: 64.99 EUR
Tax: 11.37 EUR
Total: 76.36 EUR



Yepp, that's very close to 17.5%... - definatly closer than to the 16% we have in Germany [:(]
(exactly 0.98EUR closer - must be the price to learn another lesson about international trade [:D])

[David Heath]

Hi Guys

I am working on this as we speak and plan to have this fixed today.

First you are always charged VAT. US UK EURO store it does not matter. VAT is not charge UNTIL you enter your mailing address. Second what is showning in the UK and EURO store now are our adjusted prices and an estimated 17.5 VAT included. This was not supposed to show on the products page but has. I am currently working on fixing this as well. Sorry guys I am still learning this store thing with the changes for the UK and Euro stores. I will be taken a few days off when I get this all sorted out <G>



David

[RealChuckB]

ORIGINAL: David Heath

Hi Guys

I am working on this as we speak and plan to have this fixed today.

First you are always charged VAT. US UK EURO store it does not matter. VAT is not charge UNTIL you enter your mailing address. Second what is showning in the UK and EURO store now are our adjusted prices and an estimated 17.5 VAT included. This was not supposed to show on the products page but has. I am currently working on fixing this as well. Sorry guys I am still learning this store thing with the changes for the UK and Euro stores. I will be taken a few days off when I get this all sorted out <G>



David

David,

Thank you very much for your efforts - I know that it is a quite complicated issue (and only a few people actually think it is interesting [:D])

But to be honest, you should not even think about all this stuff, BECAUSE IT IS DIGITAL RIVER'S JOB!
Goddamn, these guys CHARGE you for the outsourcing of your electronic sales and they are not doing anything else than electronic sales and they are still nto able to do it right! Give them hell! The services they offer are flawed and this is costing your money and manpower. Don't accept lame excuses or explanations. (I know, you probably care too much for your customers so you are somewhat trapped).

Thanks again!

Chuck

[Hertston]

ORIGINAL: Golf33

Sounds fair enough to me. Smokers cost an enormous amount of money in government-funded healthcare, so it's only fair that duties on cigarettes should offset at least a small proportion of that cost. Personally I'd deny medical treatment for smoking-related complaints to anyone who either started in the last 20 years, and/or failed to quit smoking on being told to do so by a doctor.

Do you think we've strayed far enough from the topic yet?

Regards
33

Forgive me for staying off-topic one more time [;)]

Actually, the amounts involved are so huge that not only do smokers "pay" for their own treatment in totality, they pay for an awful lot of other people's as well. At one time (it will be less now, as the current government has increased healthcare spending substantially, albeit with little to show for it) tobacco duty was sufficient to cover one third of the entire costs of the National Health Service.

That's not really the point anyway. The tax on tobacco isn't a levy to pay for the additional healthcare needed by smokers. If health was the issue, the government would raise the tax so high nobody could afford to smoke, petition the other EU countries to do the same, and put the money into Customs enforcement to stop cigarettes being smuggled in. Unfortunately, though... they need the money too much [;)]

[Hartford688]

David

Top. We all knew Matrix would look into really fixing this. As Chuck says, DR should have done it for you, but many thanks to you all at Matrix. Bet it has been a real pain in the a$$ for you.

Hartford

[ravinhood]

Actually a non smoker society would costs the health system more money. Non smoking people live (in average) 8 years longer. That is 8 years more with incredible high health costs (your last 10 years suck up around 85% of the total money you need for your personal health care).

Woohoo MARC right on dude. That's exactly what's happening, people who don't smoke and don't drink are living longer, thus costing the government MORE money in medicare and medicade suppliments. Amen brotherman, you tell em how it is, it's not us smokers or drinkers that are causing rising health care costs, it's the old and feeble living who should have died 10 to 20 years ago but didn't cause they didn't smoke or drink! LOL

Let's march on Washington and Parlaiment woohoo, cut, smoking and alcohol taxes and start taxing the retired! LOL

You just wait till all us baby boomers hit retirement, lol, I can only imagine the changes in the tax system when 1/3rd of the country retires all at once. haha