Soon a tax on home package deliveries?

As Amazon gains market share, downtown businesses are dying. To restore the balance, the LREM deputy of the Pas-de-Calais Benoit Potterie proposes to establish an eco-accountability contribution on parcel deliveries. This is the idea he develops in an amendment tabled to the Finance 2020 bill to "restore fiscal and territorial equity between all players in the trade through an ecological and behavioral incentive", identified by Capital.

In concrete terms, the member wants a tax to be put in place on the delivery of a home-made online order. It would be proportional to the amount of the transaction, ie 1 euro for an order of less than 100 euros, 2 euros if it is between 101 and 1000 euros and 5 euros beyond.

Municipalities with less than 20,000 inhabitants exempted

Consumers who choose to pick up their package at the Post Office or in a merchant belonging to a relay network, will not be affected by this tax. "In order not to create disparities with rural areas that do not have withdrawal points, the amendment only concerns residents of municipalities with more than 20,000 inhabitants," says the text.

This tax aims to "restore equality to public burdens between sedentary and distance selling businesses". The member points to the tax burden, including land that weighs on merchants, while the giants of e-commerce are spared. The collection would be provided by e-traders and paid to the Treasury.

Empowering consumers

Moreover this supplement to pay must also allow an awareness among the consumers. It must make him responsible "by encouraging him to pick up his parcel in a physical point and avoid a sometimes superfluous delivery" which weighs on the environment.

This is the second time that MP Benoit Potterie has the idea of ​​a tax on parcels. Supported by the association of mayors of France, he had already formulated in an amendment to the Finance Bill 2019. But the Minister of Action and Public Accounts Gerald Darmanin had retell the idea by explaining that "C is a good question but a bad answer ", especially because" obviously the tax will be passed on to people "and that it will affect all online merchants and not the US giants.