The Malaysian Institute of Road Safety Research (MIROS) will be looking to propose an exemption on import duties as well as the Goods and Services Tax (GST) levied on child restraint systems – child car seats – to make such products more affordable to parents. Said proposal will be presented to the National Road Safety Council as part of its ongoing efforts to raise the awareness on the importance of using child car seats.
“Among the challenges for parents to purchase is always the affordability issue. If it’s true that car seats are being imposed import tax duty up to 30% in view of the GST, we need to look into this,” said MIROS chairman, Tan Sri Lee Lam Thye. He stressed that something had to be done as nearly all child car seats on sale in Malaysia are imported, according to a report by theSun.
With that said, not all child car seats are imposed with heavy duties. Units sourced from China, for example, won’t have any duties imposed on them in accordance to the Asean Free Trade Agreement (AFTA), a source disclosed to the English-language daily. “But if it’s non-Afta deal, it is 30% tax duty,” disclosed the source.
Separately, MIROS director-general, Professor Wong Shaw Voon, had earlier stated that a star rating system for child car seats is under consideration. “This might be the same as what ASEAN NCAP is applying with new car. But this matter still requires an in-depth study and we have to work out on the mechanism before we can start providing a rating system for this purpose,” said Wong.
Currently, child car seats from manufacturers such as Britax, Koopers, Safe ‘n Sound and Sweet Cherry are on sale with promotional prices from as low as RM299. Recently, an eight-year old child was tragically killed when the vehicle she was in hit a speed bump – the resulting impact caused the airbag to deploy. The child was believed to have been resting her face on the dashboard and was not secured in a child car seat.
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The small girl is cute! who care about the import duty relief on child car seats….meh…
It is all about money! You die your own problem, as long as they get the tax and buy 7 series. You can see similar mindset on Proton. Before buy, flowery words tuned by Lotus macam macam, after sale problem here defect there your own problem. “Rileks lah boss, ni Proton mah. Memang macam ni. Tak suka kenapa beli?”
p1?…
How much can the government really make from sales of these items? Not much, because not everyone has qualifying children to use them and for those who do, their use is time-limited. And so, if the Government is truly Rakyat-Centric, these child seats should be tax, customs, duty and gst free! Instead, rakyat needs to lobby for any such exemptions, while the Government is totally blind towards the things that better serve and protect the rakyat.
Zero duty for cild car seats only.
How about those 5-star NCAP imported cars ? Highly safe cars deserve zero duty price also.
where to buy the car seats which are on sale?
You can chk one of the supplier instagram in the event, koopers_distribution