The Revenue Department has reiterated that all individuals who earn income – regardless of the source, including from online sales or influencer activities – are required to file and pay income tax.
Panuvat Luangvilai, deputy director-general of the department, said it is not targeting any specific group, but is monitoring the situation to ensure everyone pays their taxes correctly and fairly.
The issue is in the spotlight again following the media buzz over record-breaking livestream selling sessions by singer Ratchanok ‘Janey’ Suwannaket that brought in hundreds of millions of baht.
‘Singers or actors who livestream to sell products and earn tens of millions of baht an hour in sales are required to file and pay tax,’ Mr Panuvat said.
‘If individuals own and sell their own products, they must tally their income from sales to deduct expenses that are costs and personal allowances. The remaining amount is profit or net income, which will be used to calculate the amount of income tax.
‘Alternatively, if the income comes from being hired to live-stream, whether paid daily, hourly or via commissions, that portion of income must also be declared and taxed as personal income.’
Personal income tax is calculated on a progressive scale ranging from 5% to 35%. If total product sales exceed 1.8 million baht, the individual is also required to register for value-added tax.
For livestream sales conducted under a company or legal entity, the entity must file corporate income tax, with the tax calculated based on income after the deduction of expenses, in accordance with the prescribed conditions, said Mr Panuvat.
For example, if an individual sells products online and earns 20 million baht a day, that income must be declared for tax purposes. However, it must be determined whether the income comes from actual product sales or from being hired for promotional work.
The taxpayer is entitled to deduct either actual expenses or a lump-sum deduction of 60%, depending on the type of income received, to calculate net income.
In addition, verification is required to determine whether those figures represent actual sales or real income. This is because some investigations have found that the reported sales were instead marketing or promotional activities intended to inflate sales figures and create credibility, said Mr Panuvat.
In addition, the department partnered with large online sales platforms such as Shopee, Lazada, Grab and Line Man to report information on fee-based income earned from participating merchants, allowing it to trace and verify the actual income of online sellers.
As well, the department has launched the RD10X Project to train its local tax officers, shifting from their traditional role of handling paper tax filings to monitoring and ensuring proper tax compliance among filers, including influencers, as most taxpayers have shifted to online filing, reducing the volume of paper submissions.
The department is also developing artificial intelligence systems to track patterns of online trade and livestream sales, monitor sales volumes and assess the accuracy of tax payments.