Site co-owner Mark Mercer here, and I now can prove that Uruguays new Law of Financial Inclusion tax rebates for paying with plastic, do in fact work on non-Uruguayan cards. Unlike what the nice but often confused ATM lobby-ladies (yes, thats a job here and yes its always done by women. Wearing lovely BROU scarves.) at Banco República told him a couple of weeks ago. Well have a detailed post soon on our UruguayExpat-dot-Info site hub (our blog and the heart of our site network) which well share. But for quick evidence: Lo de Pedro grocery bill: $331 (remember $ means Pesos Uruguayos UYU, U$S means US dollar USD here in Uruguay) Paid with Fidelity Investments Visa Debit - charged $320. Descuento Ley 19210: $11 Doing the quick math, they even to my surprise handled this with the full 4% rebate for Debit card use. Remember, all prices here include IVA (Impuesto de Valor Aggregando e.g. Value Added Tax). The price on the shelf label is the price including tax, with no add-ons at the register. But now with deductions! 330 bill / 1.22 to determine the base price before 22% IVA = 271. 11 (discount) / 271 to find the percentage saved = .04 = 4%. Showing my work, because modern world is math-challenged! (Or if in the Commonwealth, maths-challenged.) This is a USA-style debit card (the type where in-US you get questions Debit or Credit? which really means process via ATM system with your ATM PIN or process via Credit Card system with your signature? I got the full 4% discount for debit cards, not the 2% discount for credit cards. Thats despite the concept of the USA-style Visa Debit and Debit MasterCard as ATM-type-cards being unknown here in Uruguay and only processable as a typical Visa or MasterCard charge. (There are Visa Debit and Debit MasterCard prepaid cards here, but the concept of a bank ATM/Debit combo card is something entirely different, the Maestro card unknown in USA which is online-debit-only.) brou.uy/web/guest/institucional/inclusion-financiera This law, but with very little facts and firsthand evidence about it, is being hotly discussed at some other Facebook Uruguay sites. Complete with rumor, anger, and conspiracy theorizing. We prefer facts and analysis to rumor here at Uruguay Expat Life. There are a lot of other issues surrounding the law, and a variety of possible subtexts for why it even exists - but from the perspective of living here, knowing how to leverage it to your financial benefit takes facts. Immediate takeaway: If your foreign (e.g. US- or other non-Uruguay) plastic payment card has a forex fee of zero-to-low under this law, its likely beneficial to you to start buying your products and services with your card. I do not yet know if this works for people who dont have a Uruguayan residency (or residente en trámite) cédula (national ID card), because I do. It was required at point of sale. Without it, were I to give a US passport, I have no idea if Id get the discount. If youve tried this and it worked with a non-UY ID, please let us know here in the comments! Note that an American Express-branded card is next-to-worthless in Uruguay for everyday life, as other than at Tienda Inglesa (who pushes their cobranded one) or at higher-end and tourist/rich-expat targeted places, nobody will take it here. Whereas Visa is accepted all over, and MasterCard widely (but not nearly as much as Visa, and thats very different from USA where its identical acceptance.) A Discover-branded card will be looked at with the Uruguayan equivalent of ¿WTF?. Though Discover is supposedly accepted via the worldwide/non-USA Diners Club network in non-USA locations, and the high-end non-local places may take Diners. But seriously, Visa, its everywhere you want to be™. And MasterCard almost as much, though not quite Priceless℠. Be on the lookout for more facts and background from us about this. On our blog, and at our Uruguay Expat Life Community where you can start a topic thread on it yourself or join in someone elses if you like - its the modern alternative to old-fashioned Uruguay web forums. is.gd/UYcommunity to join in.
Posted on: Tue, 16 Sep 2014 20:28:52 +0000
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