The Tax-Free system helps tourists all around the world to be more lenient with how they spend their money abroad by returning the amount of VAT (Value Added Tax) to those who don’t reside permanently in the country they are visiting. Time and time again Tax Free showed itself as an effective way to draw the foreigners into local trade resulting in further development of tourism in the region – after all, the more they spend in the country, the more prominence the entire tourism industry gains.
In Belarus, Tax-Free system was introduced in 2013, allowing non-residents of Eurasian Economic Community to return their money at taking goods outside the EurAsEC. Since then, Tax Free has been steadily growing in popularity, in 2018 outpacing its sales revenue by 1.4 in comparison to 2017. Belarus refunds 15% of the purchase price without VAT. Also, Belarusian Tax Free doesn’t cover certain types of goods, such as tobacco products, food, alcoholic products, children’s products and fuel.
