MoF urges TCM practitioners to remit service tax collected since 2018 back to govt

KUALA Traditional and complementary medicine (TCM) practitioners who have collected service tax since 2018 are required to submit and remit them back to the government, according to the Ministry of Finance (MoF).

Deputy Finance Minister Lim Hui Ying said TCM practitioners who have not collected the tax have to declare it to the Customs Department.

“We are not going to track back. If you have collected from your patients (the service tax), you have to remit to the government whatever you have collected,” she said in a press conference after attending an event, here yesterday.

She explained that TCM practitioners have been included in the service tax since 2018 as those that have RM500,000 in revenue in a year are supposed to register and pay the tax accordingly.

“Not only Chinese TCM but there are other seven services also recognised by Ministry of Health (MoH), so that is why we are meeting them and MoH, as the regulator, has recognised these seven categories to be exempted from the service tax,” she said.

Earlier, Finance Minister II Datuk Seri Amir Hamzah Azizan announced that TCM practitioners who are registered under the T&CM Act 2016 will be exempted from the eight per cent service tax. He said as long as the TCM practitioners are registered with the Act under the MoH, they will be exempted from the service tax that will come into effect on March 1 this year.

Amir Hamzah said in line with this decision, TCM practitioners who have registered with the Act do not need to register with the Customs Department and subsequently do not need to impose the service tax on the following services: Malay traditional medicine, Chinese traditional medicine, Indian traditional medicine, homoeopathy, chiropractic, osteopathy, and Islamic medical practices.