Liberal proposed GST relief creates complications for POS systems

“For retailers, they’re going to have a lot of work to do in order to implement this, and a lot more than people think,” said Ivan Long, Auto Star Compusystems vice president of operations.

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The federal government announced Thursday that tax breaks would be implemented for Canadians for two months over the upcoming holiday season.

Long said that retailers have their work cut out for them.

“The way the rules, as they’ve been proposed or written, are that there’s a lot of exceptions,” he said.

“Children’s toys are exempt from GST if they’re in certain categories. Some magazines are exempt. Some liquor is exempt,” he added.

“Rather than doing it by category broadly, a lot of retailers are going to have to look at items on a case-by-case basis to determine if that will be exempt,”

Auto Star writes point of sale and retail software for retailers across Canada. Long says managing grocery store and pharmacy taxes are one of their responsibilities.

Groceries, children’s clothing, meals at restaurants, and alcohol are some of the items the government will provide relief for.

The tax break wouldn’t be applied to all items, creating complications for point of sale systems – as businesses must allocate designated entries.

Long said that, while the relief is appreciated, it will also be an inconvenience to many businesses once implemented at a busy time of year.

“Typically the retailer stores are responsible for all of their own data and for making the decisions. Our role is to help them and to try and make the process as simple as possible and teach them,” he said.

“You don’t change taxes on items very often, and so really what that comes down to in our role is to make our software easy to change taxes for and to provide them the assistance when they’re doing something that they don’t do very often,” he added.

The government imposed tax break is set to take effect from Dec.14 until Feb.15 of 2025.

It will bring ease to Canadians purchasing goods, but perhaps grief to businesses applying the relief.

by Jayk Sterkenburg

Liberal proposed GST relief creates complications for POS systems

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