2-percent contribution to state channel TRT removed from electricity bills

* Photo: Anadolu Agency (AA)

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The Bill of Law on Amendments to Some Laws, which also foresees the removal of the TRT contribution share from the sale of electrical energy, has been accepted by the Parliamentary Commission on Industry, Trade, Energy, Natural Resources, Information and Technology.

President and Justice and Development Party (AKP) Chair Recep Tayyip Erdoğan previously announced that the state channel TRT's share and the energy fund cuts would be removed from electricity bills.

With the bill of law drawn up by the ruling AKP MPs and presented to the Parliament, the related law has been amended and the TRT contribution levied on the sale of electrical energy has been removed.

How will it affect the bills?

Reducing the payment items in the electricity bills as part of the voted and accepted electrical energy fund agreements aims to reduce the financial burden on consumers and to simplify the bills.

On the other hand, all of the taxes levied on electricity bills account for nearly 21 percent of the total amount to be paid. The biggest tax item is the Value Added Tax (VAT). In addition to this, an Energy Fund Fee and a TRT contribution share were also collected from electricity bills.

Removing the Energy Fund Fee and the state channel TRT's contribution share from the sale of electrical energy means that an average electricity bill of 228 Turkish Lira will be reduced by 3.2 Turkish Lira.

Taxes of the TRT

The law no. 3093 regulating the revenues of the state channel TRT was enacted in 1984. The law listed the fees to be collected by the TRT as well as the share to be allocated to the channel from the electrical energy revenue. According to the law currently in effect, this rate is 2 percent.

The consumers who have an industrial registry certificate and the organized industrial zones are exempted from paying the TRT contribution.

Moreover, the state channel TRT also collects banderol fees of 0.01 percent to 16 percent from several products ranging from televisions, radios and mobile phones to smart watches, vehicles and tablets.

TRT's revenue

As reported by Ozan Bingöl on vergiyedair.com, the total income of TRT in the 16-year period between 2004 and 2019 was 23.9 billion Turkish Lira, 10.4 billion Turkish Lira of which was bandrol fees and 9.5 billion Turkish Lira of which was the energy contribution share.

Only in 2019, the TRT earned a total revenue of 3 billion 170 million Turkish Lira and 1 billion 45 million Turkish Lira of this total revenue was from the bills. In other words, the TRT earns one third of its revenue from electricity bills. (TP/SD)