Delinquent taxpayers in South Korea who each owes 300 million won ($254,700) or more in unpaid taxes would not be able to bring in expensive luxury items they purchase during travelling abroad or receive orders they make at foreign e-commerce sites from early next year.

According to multiple sources from the National Assembly and the Ministry of Strategy and Finance on Friday, the Korean government is working to revise the national tax collection law and customs law as part of efforts to effectively recover unpaid taxes from delinquent taxpayers. The revision will allow the government to seize expensive items purchased by delinquent taxpayers who each owes 300 million won or more from overseas during travelling or foreign e-commerce sites like Amazon.com.

Currently, the government has no legal grounds to charge delinquent taxpayers even if they bring in their purchases with high price tags from overseas as the national tax law that imposes tax on negligent taxpayers and the customs law that manages immigration goods are separately applied.

The related bill providing the government legal basis to charge delinquent taxpayers has been introduced by Saenuri Party lawmaker Lee Hye-hoon earlier this month, and it is likely to pass the National Assembly next month.

As soon as the related bill is approved by other lawmakers, the government is considering tighter inspection on items purchased by high delinquent taxpayers during travelling abroad or from foreign e-commerce sites and confiscating them until they pay their unpaid taxes. The plan aims to give those who habitually delay paying taxes immigration hassle, forcing them to clear all of their taxes in arrears.

Currently, there are about 12,000 Koreans that each owes the government 300 million won or more in taxes whose profiles have been disclosed. About 4,000 of them have already been banned from traveling overseas while an 8,000 will be newly subject to enhanced crackdown following the latest passage of the bill.

An unnamed government official said that the finance ministry, the National Tax Services (NTS), and Korea Customs Service have agreed to expand the target for immigration inspection starting with an enforceable range. Tighter immigration control will likely take place in January next year at earliest or April at latest.

Representative Lee of the Saenuri Party has also submitted a bill to revise the national tax collection law so that the profiles of those delinquent taxpayers that have not paid taxes for over one year or those whose unpaid tax amount is over 5 million won and have delayed paying taxes three times within a year are revealed on the NTS web site.

By Lee Seung-yoon

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