Written answers
Thursday, 28 June 2007
Department of Finance
Tax Yield
5:00 pm
John Cregan (Limerick West, Fianna Fail)
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Question 94: To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Finance the current charges on laser, credit cards and current accounts; the annual tax from this source; his views on dropping these charges and the cost of same for pensioners with free banking as currently many of these bank accounts held by elderly people have few transactions through them and often are only held to process crossed cheques and so on; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [18357/07]
Brian Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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A fixed stamp duty is chargeable on ATM cards, Laser cards, cards with combined ATM & Laser functions, credit card accounts and on cheques. There are no other stamp duty charges on current accounts. The stamp duty rates applicable are as follows:
| Stamp Duty | Rate | Application |
| Cheques | 15c | Applied when cheque book is issued |
| ATM Cards | €10 | Applied on all cards active on 31 December each year. |
| Laser Cards | €10 | Applied on all cards active on 31 December each year. |
| Combined ATM & Debit Cards | €20 | Applied on all cards active on 31 December each year. Where only one function was used in the tax year, only €10 is charged. |
| Credit Card Account | €40 | Applied on accounts (not cards) in April in respect of the previous April to March. |
The yield in 2006 for each of these stamp duties is as follows:
| Stamp Duty | Yield |
| €m | |
| Cheques | 16.7 |
| ATM Cards | 18.0 |
| Laser Cards | 0.6 |
| Combined ATM & Debit Cards | 17.7 |
| Credit Card Account | 67.8 |
| Total | 120.8 |
Information is not available that would allow a costing to be made of exempting the elderly from stamp duties on financial cards and cheques. The stamp duty on cheques, bills of exchange and promissory notes has existed for many years and when electronic means of money transfers were subsequently introduced, stamp duty was gradually extended to these products to ensure that the stamp duty from cheques etc. was not eroded.
There are no plans to introduce such exemptions to stamp duty for any category of individual. Stamp duties on financial cards are significant contributors to the Exchequer and are in accordance with the overall taxation policy of widening the tax base in order to keep direct tax rates generally low.
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