Fiscal tax at Simpang Tiga airport

Fiscal tax at Simpang Tiga airport

From Kompas

I am a post graduate student at the Malaysian Agriculture University. Last Idul Fitri I went home to celebrate the holiday. Before my departure, I was advised by the immigration official of the Indonesian Embassy in Kuala Lumpur to change my passport address from Bogor (Indonesia) to Selangor, Malaysia and later was stamped penlu by immigration, which indicates that I was a foreign resident during my stay in Indonesia. Through this procedure I could be exempted from the fiscal tax of Rp 250,000.

On arrival at Simpang Tiga airport in Pekanbaru (Feb. 20, 1995) everything went well, and my passport was stamped penlu (foreign resident) by the immigration office. For this they asked Rp 15,000.

But I was very surprised when I returned to Malaysia through the same airport (March 10, 1995). The official at the Fiscal Office refused to give me a fiscal-free certificate on the grounds that I was a private student, not a government-sponsored student.

The penlu certificate was not valid because, they said, I did not have a Malaysian Identity Card. The student card and the letter from the Education Attache of the Indonesian Embassy in Kuala Lumpur were not acceptable.

When I inquired why other students like me were entitled to the exemption of the fiscal tax in the past, they replied that this regulation had been enforced only since Feb. 23, 1995. But why on that date? They calmly replied they were too busy to pay attention to the regulation Keppres No 46/1994 concerning the fiscal tax.

Because of this problem, my departure was delayed for three days, I missed the lectures and a seminar that I was supposed to attend and I paid the Rp 250,000. Ironically, my colleagues who departed from Cengkareng or Polonia airport said they were exempted from the fiscal tax.

IRWANDI

Selangor, Malaysia