Taxation of e‐commerce in Hong Kong: applying UK and US experience
Due to the rapid growth of electronic commerce worldwide, the traditional approach of taxing business profits in Hong Kong, a source‐based common law jurisdiction, warrants a close review as to its compatibility with such a modern way of doing business. Although the Inland Revenue Department of Hong Kong has issued its views on the taxation of electronic commerce profits as Departmental Interpretation and Practice Note 39, much of the treatment of such profits follow the conventional wisdom of taxing business profits as set in the source‐based rules. This paper reviews the present situation of taxing profits arising from electronic commerce transactions in Hong Kong and compares it with the cases of the UK and the USA. Problems in formulating water‐tight tax law, accounting standards for intangible assets, and coping with cross‐border fraud, indicate that progress may not be straightforward. Issues as to fairness, and the difficulty of taxing such receipts are raised, followed by recommendations.
The Key Factors Affecting B2C Acceptance in Egypt: An Empirical Investigation
This research aims at investigating the effect of interrelated micro-variables (level of trust, perceived security and perceived self-efficacy) and macro-variables (availability of active legislations and technological level) on the acceptance of E-commerce as the independent variable in Egypt. Applying the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) and adopting quantitative research methodology, questionnaires were carried out amongst 600 Egyptian consumers. The results of the survey indicate that trust, security, current technological level, active legislations and self- efficacy all affected Egyptians consumers’ acceptance of business-to-consumer (B2C) e-commerce. The research further discusses significant implications that can be adopted at both the micro and macro levels in Egypt and presents the Conceptual Model for B2C acceptance in Egypt.
Application of the Kano Model for a Better Understanding of Customer Requirements in Higher Education—A Pilot Study
Various pieces of information and knowledge turn into “know-how” simply by their application in the market. This applies to all spheres of activities. It is therefore important to know and understand the requirements of customers already in the stage of making a product, and to confront these with the possibilities of a producer. In this article we are exploring the possibilities of a better understanding of the requirements of customers and stakeholders in the process of the creation of products in educational services. In particular, we examined seven general requirements: practice orientation, ethical orientation, research orientation, quality resources, innovation orientation, skills orientation, and quality staff. We use the Kano model on a pilot sample of respondents at an institution of higher education. Our results showed that “practice orientation” and “quality resources” are the most stable requirements, while “quality staff” is the least stable. The most linear requirement (the same effect on satisfaction and dissatisfaction) is “innovation orientation”. “Research orientation” belongs to attractive requirements and we also found that in the case of “ethical orientation” there are weak relations between positive and negative responses in our survey. The “skills orientation” proved to be too general, and our research shows that it could be indifferent. It is therefore advisable to specify the investigated skills when investigating requirements on educational services. The main contribution based on the proposed research procedures is an effective linking of customers and producers already from the beginning of constructing a value chain. Investing in sophisticated management approaches when modelling products and processes can thus become a significant source of the competitive advantage of an educational institution. At the same time, it is a contribution to better placing of its graduates in the labor market.