Tourists in St. Petersburg will now pay a resort fee. What amount are we talking about and who will it affect?

Local authorities canceled the resort fee in the region since March 11, 2022

And provided that all tourists remain in hotels for more than 24 hours

At the same time, in Portugal, the tourist fee is charged only in the first seven days of stay.

The State Duma and the Federation Council adopted a law on resort fees in St. Petersburg - the city was connected to an experimental program, in which only four Russian regions previously participated. As a result, from 2023, hotels may rise in price in St. Petersburg.

"Paper" studied the text of the document and the experience of other cities. We tell you what a new tax rate can be, how much money will help out and what the funds collected will be spent on.

Is Petersburg a resort? What is the idea of ​​a new fee? ↓

In 2018, the new tax was launched precisely in the resort regions of Russia: in Crimea , the Krasnodar Territory and the Stavropol Territory. In addition, the Altai Territory was included in the experiment - another popular location for domestic tourism. This experiment was scheduled for four years-until December 31, 2022.

The Stavropol authorities seemed successful, and they introduced a bill to the State Duma on the extension of the resort fee until the end of 2024. The Duma and the Federation Council agreed and added to the experiment of Petersburg.

In parallel, the Russian authorities are preparing a bill on tourist training: this document will allow you to levy tax from tourists not only in resort cities, but also in other regions. It can be introduced to the State Duma by the summer of 2023, said Valentina Matvienko, Speaker of the Council.

Probably, Smolny did not want to wait for the development of a new bill and asked to include Petersburg in the law on resort fees. Governor Alexander Beglov has already thanked the St. Petersburg State Duma deputies for the "coordinated work and protection of the interests of the city."

When will the resort fee be introduced? ↓

The St. Petersburg authorities will be able to charge a resort fee from tourists already in 2023. The exact date of entering a new tax and its size will determine the Smolny.

Who will have to pay it? ↓

Adult tourists - guests of St. Petersburg hotels and hotels living there for more than 24 hours will pay for over 24 hours. The first day is not taxed, the fee for the rest of the days of residence will be added to the cost of numbers. Objects of accommodation: hotels and hotels should charge a resort fee.

The non -payment of the new tax will threaten individuals with an administrative fine of 500 rubles to 2 thousand. For business, fines are higher: from 5 to 15 thousand rubles.

Who will be exempted from paying tax? ↓

The resort fee is not charged from Petersburgers: those who are registered or constantly working in the city.

In addition, some categories of tourists are exempted from tax: for example, participants in the Great Patriotic War, disabled people and athletes.

How much money will tourists have to pay? ↓

The federal law does not establish the exact amount of the resort fee - the law only says that the tax cannot exceed 100 rubles per day of residence. “The regional government, the parliament will already determine, it will be 10 rubles, 20, 50 or 100, in order to maintain the attractiveness of the tourist region and not to go too far,” the head of the Federation Council Valentina Matvienko explained this decision.

In addition, local authorities can adjust the fees depending on the season, the length of stay of tourists and other factors. In practice, this opportunity is most often neglected - for example, in the Altai and Stavropol Territories, the collection is now 50 rubles, regardless of the season and the location of tourists. There is tax differentiation only in the Krasnodar Territory: tourists pay 50 rubles per day of stay in Sochi and 30 rubles for living in other places of the region.

The decision on the size of the resort fee in St. Petersburg has not yet been made. The head of the Tourism Development Committee, Sergei Korneev, said that Smolny would focus on the experience of other regions, where from tourists they are levied from 30 to 50 rubles per day. “In any case, [fees] will not be burdensome for guests of the city,” the official noted.

“Paper” asked questions about the introduction of a resort fee to several St. Petersburg hotels, but hoteliers are not yet ready to comment on a new tax.

Will this affect apartments, hostels and apartments? ↓

Tourists who have stopped in private apartments should not pay the collection, lawyer Alexei Prokhorov told Moika 78 . According to him, now only legal entities pay tax by law: hotels, hotels, hostels and other organizations (sanatoriums, recreation centers).

The resort fee in the private sector is not charged due to difficulties in administering payments, but over time this situation may change, Prokhorov suggests.

How much money can I help out and what will they spend it on? ↓

All money collected from tourists will go to the regional budget for the development of tourist infrastructure: restoration of monuments and attractions, the creation of new facilities. “This is such a target story when guests of the city can see specifically that they paid 50 rubles-and the next time they see some interesting place, a historical building, where it is directly written that it is restored at the expense of the tourist fee,” explained the head of the St. Petersburg tourism development committee Sergey Korneev.

For example, in the Stavropol Territory, at the expense of the resort fee, the Kurortny park in Essentuki, the lower cascade staircase in Zheleznovodsk, pedestrian zones on Uritsky Street in Kislovodsk and dozens of other objects were improved .

According to the Ministry of Economic Development, from 2018 to 2021, four regions - a participant in an experiment on the introduction of a resort fee was collected for all 1.56 billion rubles. In St. Petersburg, there may be more amounts-over 11 months of 2022, over 7 million tourists visited the city, said Vice-Governor Boris Piotrovsky. At the maximum collection rate, this is at least 700 million rubles per year.

What travel taxes are in other countries? ↓

Tools from tourists for accommodation operate in many European cities: for example, in Barcelona, ​​a tourist tax is from 1 to 3.85 euros per day per person (from 63 to 243 rubles at the current rate), and in Lisbon - 2 euros per day from each tourist .

Guests of hotels in Venice pay from 1 to 5 euros per day, and local authorities plan to increase tax and launch a special online system for paying for stay in the city.

There are taxes on hotels not only in Europe: for example, in New York, from guests, from a additional 50 cents to $ 2 per night are charged .

Photo on the cover: Olga / Flickr / CC-by-SA 2.0

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