Chairperson of Commission XI of the House of Representatives of the Republic of Indonesia, Dito Ganinduto signs minutes of meeting after deliberating a Bill on Stamp Duty with Finance Minister and Law and Human Rights Minister at Parliamentary Building, Senayan, Jakarta, Thursday (3/9/2020). Photo : Arief/Man

The House’s Commission XI and the government have officially agreed on the Bill on Stamp Duty to be deliberated at Plenary Session (second-level deliberation) to pass it into law. The new law will replace the Law Number 23 of 1985 on Stamp Duty, which only regulates documents printed or signed on paper. The law does not regulate the use of electronic document.

If passed into law, the new law will adopt single tariff system. The new stamp duty will be increased to Rp. 10.000 starting on 1 January 2021. The current law adopts two-tariff system: Rp. 3.000 and Rp. 6.000. The new tariff will apply to any business documents that contains deals worth more than Rp. 5 Million.

The Chairperson of the House’s Commission XI Dito Ganinduto said that all factions agreed to continue deliberation of the bill at Plenary Session except Prosperous Justice Party (PKS) being the only one adding a note to the bill.

“The House and the government represented by Finance Minister and Law and Human Rights Minister have reached agreement on Stamp Duty Bill. We will submit this to the House Leaders to be deliberated in the second-level deliberation at Plenary Session to be passed into law.” said Ganinduto after signing minutes of meeting at Parliamentary Building, Senayan, Jakarta, Thursday (3/9/2020).

After years of deliberation since 2018 and being carried over in the 2020 National Legislation Program (Prolegnas) priority list, finally this bill, consisting of 32 articles, is deliberated and will proceed to the final decision at the Plenary Session. Previously, the Finance Minister, Sri Mulyani mentioned in her presentation that the revisions on the 6 clusters of Stamp Duty Bill were compiled according to the current development and designed to provide more legal certainty.

The first cluster describes the expansion of definition of stamp duty objects documents which now include not only paper but also electronic documents. In addition, there are also additional objects in the revision, namely objects in the form of auction and securities transaction documents.

The second cluster contains the revision of stamp duty rate from the previous two tariffs of Rp.3,000 and Rp.6,000 to a single tariff of Rp.10,000. This bill will certainly be in favor of small and medium enterprises as they do not have to pay stamp duties for documents with a value of Rp.5,000,000 or less. In the previous provision, the documents with a value of Rp.1,000,000 or more are subject to stamp duty. The third cluster describes the time settings of the payable stamp duty which are detailed by document types.

The fourth cluster explains the latest stamp duty subjects that regulate the details of payable parties based on the types of document. The fifth cluster contains the provisions for payment in the form of electronic stamp duty that are in line with today’s technological developments. She stated that the provisions would provide legal certainty to electronic documents.

The sixth cluster describes sanctions for non-compliance with paying stamp duty. The minister said the Working Committee had agreed that there are administrative and criminal sanctions for non-compliance with and the lateness in fulfilling the obligation of paying stamp duty.

“As you may understand, at the deliberation in the working committee, we have agreed on some policy adjustments on stamp duty that fundamentally replace the regulation that have not undergone any changes for 34 years. Changes are needed to cope with the condition of economy, social, legal, and information technology that have developed rapidly,” concluded the Minister.