Hawaii Airport “duty free” Shop charges taxes?
Today is my first time buying something at airport DFS other than cigarettes because I always travel UA or AA and their international departure terminals don’t carry the cosmetic brand my wife uses. When I pay for the cosmetic, I notice the amount is not a whole number, the sales person told me Hawaii state adds 4% sales tax on cosmetic even in DFS store for international departure. This is really funny, I ended up paying more than what I paid in the US mainland because if online purchase, I have cashback, if in store purchase, I can get lots lots of samples.
hard to understand why the charge taxes in Duty free shop for international departure.
Yi said,
Hawaii state charges general excise tax on all sales from business owners.It is not sales tax.
So by selling you $100 products, the business owner will need to pay $4 to the state. Most owner will collect this from customer. While they can choose visibly pass it to you(that is not your case), they can also choose not to do that(this way, the total price is already adjusted to include this surcharge).
Looks the only way not to pay this 4% is to ask the store to ship it out of the state. However, I don’t think it is possible to find a “free shipping” offer from a Hawaii store
Troy said,
@yi, thanks for letting me know, this is interesting!
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