IT IS COLLOQUIALLY known as 'doing a Chek Lap Kok runner'. The practice among expatriates of leaving Hong Kong to avoid paying income tax bills - some departing so hurriedly that they call bosses from Chek Lap Kok airport to resign - has come under the scrutiny of officials and prompted proposals for a crackdown which is being opposed by foreign employers' groups as discriminatory.
So-called 'high-risk' workers - a term used to refer to expatriate employees - may be forced to buy tax certificates when they receive their pay cheques and foreign workers may even have taxes docked by employers from monthly wages, rather than simply receive an annual lump sum demand, as is the case at present.
The system came under the microscope of the Audit Commission which released a scathing report on Wednesday, blasting employers who failed promptly to tell tax collectors when their employees leave. It criticised the Inland Revenue Department for allegedly not taking the problem seriously enough and estimated tax authorities had to write off $213 million in lost revenue over the past three years from expatriates fleeing Hong Kong without settling their bills.
While the issue has captured headlines over the past two days, a detailed examination of government documents shows it is a relatively small problem.
Just 739 employees left without paying taxes in the last financial year, depriving the Inland Revenue Department of $58.5 million. Those dodging taxes by leaving Hong Kong amount to just 0.2 per cent of the expatriate population (excluding Filipinos, most of whom are domestic workers whose low wages are not taxed). The amount written off was just 0.2 per cent of the $24.8 billion collected in salaries tax last year.
Nevertheless, the Audit Commission's report on the issue stated that it considers the tax lost from employees recruited from outside Hong Kong to be 'substantial'.
An Australian working at a stock brokerage yesterday recalled his departure in the mid-1990s. 'I decided on a whim - and I later regretted it - that I would rather be in Sydney,' said the businessman, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.