Malaysia will levy a travel tax on foreign tourists?

According to Malaysian media reports, Malaysian Minister of Tourism and Culture Datuk Seri Nazri confirmed that the hotel tourism tax originally planned to be levied on July 1 day has not been prepared, so it will be postponed until August 1 day; According to the new measures, Malaysian citizens will not have to pay travel tax when staying in three-star or less hotels, but all foreign tourists must pay travel tax.

Nazri said that the unit responsible for collecting tourism tax is the Customs Bureau. "We plan to start collecting this tax in July 1, but it's not ready yet, so we temporarily move it to August1; Of course, this is just our goal. Whether it can be implemented smoothly depends on the preparations of the Customs Bureau. "

Nazri pointed out that the upcoming tourism tax is divided into four levels, and 5-star hotels will levy a tax of RM 20 per night; 4 stars receive RM10; 3 stars receive RM 5；; Hotels with 2 stars and below will charge RM 2.50.

The announcement issued by the General Administration of Customs a few days ago shows that from August, a tourist tax will be levied on all hotels. However, on June 9th, Nazri confirmed that the hotel tourism tax will be levied on July 1. This issue immediately aroused the dissatisfaction of the East Malaysian government. Datuk Abdul Karin, Minister of Tourism, Art, Culture, Youth and Sports in Shazhou, even had an altercation with Nazri, and the federal minister from East Malaysia joined the ranks of the ministers in support of Shazhou, which led to a storm on the topic of tourism tax in the city. Nazri later softened his stance, saying that the government is still formulating the relevant mechanism of tourism tax and will "flexibly handle the implementation date".

Personally, I estimate that levying tourism tax on all foreign tourists will have an impact on Malaysia's tourism industry.