Week 5 & 6

The Upcoming GST Nightmare

(26/01/15-6/02/15)

     Waking up early in the morning, have a quick breakfast, rush to train station and take LRT to Ampang Park have now become my daily routine! Somehow, last Monday is slightly different from my daily routine where I need to change few LRT line to reach Berjaya Time Square for GST Generic Briefing Session. When I arrive, I actually went into Manhattan VI instead of Manhattan V as I not familiar with that place which had made me embarrassed in the early morning. Thanks god that everything went smooth when I finally reach the correct venue and take a seat.

   To be honest, I was clueless and know nothing about Goods and Services (GST) but the name of it. Gratefully, my supervisor, Miss Low passed me a softcopy of the GST File to go through it the week before I attend the talks. To ensure that I have better understanding of GST, I wrote down some note for own goods. Lucky enough, I can fully digest the GST knowledge given by the speaker. In case you not really understand how GST works, below is a short briefing of it.

The status of GST in Malaysia is announced in Budget 2014 on 25^th October 2013 to replaces the present Sales Tax (1972) & Service Tax (1975) and the implementation date is set on 1^st of April 2015 at the GST rate of 6%. The Mandatory Registration threshold must have an annual taxable turnover exceeded RM 500,000. The main criteria for GST are to be charged on any supply of goods or services if fulfills all the following conditions, unless exempt:  Made in Malaysia, A taxable supply, Made by a registered person and in the course of furtherance of the business. There are two type of supply which further separate down to taxable supply and non-taxable supply. Standard-rated supply and zero-rated supply is fall under taxable supply, while exempt supply and out-of-scope supply is fall under non-taxable supply.

	Type of Supply	Output tax	Input Tax
Taxable Supply	Standard-Rated	6%	Claimable
	Zero-rated	0%
Non-Taxable Supply	Exempt	No GST	Not Claimable
	Out-of-scope	Disregard

            With a better understanding on how GST works and it’s impacted on varies services provided by the bank, I am eligible to help out my supervisor on GST Project. I was given job tasks of updating the GST Registered Company into the SAP System. It was an easy job for me but it required a lot of attention as the company might be local or overseas. The categories of company also vary from each others, thus it required sometime to update the SAP system. Besides, the bank needs to reply the vendor if they ask for our GST information. Thereby, I was the middleman who fills up all the registration number of GST, name of the company, registration date, and person in-charge details as well as gets the signature from our head of finance. The scanning and reply will then handle by See Nin (Person in-charge of GST). Attentive to details is even particular especially to company who come with few requirement.

I would say I was lucky enough to involve in GST Project as I learnt a lot throughout the process. I am glad and happy that the supervisor compliment that I provided her assistant because she and her coordinator of the department are also busy to take care of every single thing. In my opinion, getting the chance to involve in GST Project will actually help me in my school projects. For instance, I was one of the candidates chosen for Taylor’s Talent Management program; we need to come out with a local project involving Community Services and in order to raise fund we are required to sell merchandise, I able to determine whether we the project are involve with GST. Apart from that, I have found myself a new related topic that I can discuss and chat with businessmen/ businesswomen in the future even colleague which rather an advantages for myself.


Key Learning:

Don’t Be Afraid To Ask Questions

I totally agree to what my tutor told me before that as an intern, you are there to learn as much as possible and no doubt the best way to do is to “Ask” when you have questions. When I was asked to tackle GST Project, I was totally unfamiliar with it despite the fact that I did so some research on it (because GST in Bank Services is different thus less information in websites).  Once I asked my supervisor about the GST procedure, I was able to fully understand it. Also, asking questions can open the door to more topics with colleagues to discuss and talk which are vital for relationship building relationship in the office.

Discipline

My discipline in time management, punctuality and self-control had improved over the period. I have learnt control my anger and stress as well as train myself to be in office early every time. It is because reaching office early, I able to chat with the cleaner, read newspaper as well as forming a good impression.  Besides, I dress up formally as an office lady every day as I believe it is where the first impression made.