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Oregon currently taxes cell phone plans to fund it’s 911 call centers, but prepaid plans are exempt from the current law. As more people switch to prepaid plans (because they make more sense financially, duh), the state’s revenues are dropping. Lawmakers are looking at ways to include prepaid plans in a new law. The state currently adds 75 cents per month on cell phone bills, but since prepaid plans don’t have bills, the plans aren’t taxed.

The problem is that prepaid plans are typically flat rates in whole dollar amounts. For example, an unlimited monthly plan from MetroPCS is $40 a month. The plans are typically sold on cards with the dollar amount printed on the front. So if Oregon passes this law, will MetroPCS have to start selling a $40.75 unlimited minutes plan? Probably not. What they will probably do is continue charging the same amount and just loose 75 cents on every transaction. Or maybe they will raise their rates to the next round number like $45, but only in Oregon. Which means they will have to print new cards just for Oregon, change their marketing material for Oregon, change their website for Oregon customers, etc. Either way it will cost the carriers a significant amount of money. It will be interesting to see what the state comes up with since other states will follow suit.

Read more: http://www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2013/03/legislature_looking_at_taxing.html

 

Filed under: Prepaid News

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