Hey, look what I did today...

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And you thought I was going to post up a picture of a used condom, aren't you? tsk tsk tsk....

Have a lovely long weekend!

Fame in plain

A lot of people have asked me… “Zewt, how did you get so famous?” First and foremost, I don’t think I am famous per se. To me, I just happen to have a satisfactory level of readership. For that, I have to thank all of you.

Honestly, I am also curious as to how some bloggers command such incredible level of fame. The other day, I was browsing through a very famous blog of a particular country. In case you’re wondering, I am not referring to the local Mr. Sia nor Ms. Xia down south.

My findings were somewhat startling, to me at least. Certainly, there are some very interesting articles by this blogger about life in general but for most part, articles are about the general life of the blogger. It’s like a diary, but written only with information the blogger wishes to share with the reader.

An entry can be very long, detailing exactly what the blogger did in a particular day and it can also be as short as “hey, look what I did today…” – followed by a picture of a shattered glass, indicating that the blogger dropped a glass on the floor that day. Sounds interesting? Doesn’t appears so, isn’t it?

Nevertheless, that blog commands incredible level of traffic and is also capable of attracting lucrative adverts. How so?

Generally, I think there is an in-built need for us humans to make connection. Some may call it as being nosy but to me, it’s this thing called ‘human touch’. We all want to know what happen to others, as long as it is not overly dull. And when you have known a person to a certain level, you just want to know more.

So if you are cracking your head trying to put up thought stimulating entries which I tend to do sometimes (the cracking head part), perhaps we can just sit back and put into words what happen to us today. After all, lives are meant to be interesting. Else, we won’t be so afraid of death.

Try doing a “hey, look what I did today…” and follow that up with a picture of a used condom… I am sure people will be dying to know what it is exactly that you did…

Maybe I will do just that…


2 years go… Is it worth it?

Why UK companies will not do business in Malaysia in the future

Let’s put it plain and simple…

UK corporate tax rate = 28%
Malaysia corporate tax rate = 25%
A UK-subsidiary in Malaysia will pay tax on its profits at 25%. Thereafter, when the profits are being repatriated to UK in the form of dividend, the UK holding company will have to pay an additional 3% of tax (28% - 25%) on the gross dividend.

Put simply, a $100 profit means $25 tax paid in Malaysia and $3 paid in UK. Hence, in totality, profit of a UK corporation should only suffer a maximum of 28% tax. Of course, the exact mechanism is slightly more complicated but this is the gist of it. That is how it works, or how it will work until end of June 2009.

The UK govt has just announced that dividends received by a UK company from its subsidiary around the world (i.e. foreign dividends) will be fully tax exempt effective 1 July 2009. Put simply, a UK company will not need to top up the 3% tax if it receives dividend from Malaysia.

What has that got to do with less investments coming into Malaysia? Doesn’t seems to bother us right?... WRONG!

Although a UK company no longer needs to top up the 3% of tax on dividend received from Malaysia, the profit will still suffer 25% Malaysian corporate tax. This is bad because the UK company can choose to set up its business in countries like Singapore (“SG”) and Hong Kong (“HK”).

The tax rate in SG and HK is 18% and 16.5% respectively. A UK company will need to top up 10% and 11.5% of tax previously in respect of dividend coming in from those countries. With the new rule, that is not the case anymore. In effect, the profit of a UK Group will suffer 25% if they do business in Malaysia but will only suffer 18% and 16.5% of tax if they do business in SG or HK. That is tax savings of 7% / 8.5% if they can somehow move their profits from Malaysia to SG / HK.

“Zewt, not all business can be done in SG / HK. Maybe some businesses have to be done in Malaysia?”

A very good question indeed if the above occurs to you. Well, with the wonders of globalisation, a lot of things can be done to facilitate profits being made solely in SG and/or HK. In fact, I can tell you that motion has already started by some big UK corporations to ensure that profits are booked in HK.

8.5% of tax savings (if profits are booked in HK) is A LOT of money. Top that up with the pleasure of having to deal with govt agencies in SG/HK vs. Malaysia; I would not bet against UK corporations moving their operations elsewhere.

Well, think about it. If you are a boss of a UK company, what would you do?


2 years go… Why is the rum gone?

The Big 4

Some people have been asking me… “Zewt, what is this big-4 that accountants talk about?” Many non-accounting people are quite oblivious about this jargon while some perceived the big-4 as some accounting principles. I just think they are lazy to check Wikipedia or even google it.

Well, the answer is plain and simple. The big-4 refers to the 4 biggest audit / accounting firms currently still exist in the world. I said “currently still exist” because the big-4 used to be the big-8. After a succession of mergers, it became big-5. In fact, when I first entered the accounting world, it was already big-5.

Big-5 became big-4 when Arthur Andersen (“AA”) collapsed due to the Enron scandal. What happened was AA, being the auditor for this big company in the USA called Enron, failed to detect large amounts of debts and losses within the Enron group, thus causing the profit to be over reported. The question is of course, did AA fail to detect or... …?

When the secret got out, the shares plunged from US$90 to less than US$0.50 and Enron, together with AA; transformed from corporate giants to corporate history.

Some may ask, what exactly is the role of an auditor? Well, perhaps I can talk about it another day.

So, for those who wants to know who exactly is part of this big-4… they are…

PriceWaterhouse Coopers or famously known as PwC;
Klynveld Peat MarWick Goerdeler or famously known as KPMG;
Ernst & Young or famously known as EY; and
Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu or famously known as Deloitte.

All of the above have presence in Malaysia and they have been ruthless slaves-masters to many accounting graduates for years. Their recruitment strategy is one that centres upon ensuring that they are always under-staff. That is why late nights are a norm.

It’s like a corporate symbiosis where accounting graduates joined them to obtain what is perceived as priceless experience while in return, the Big 4 squeeze the life out of them. I believe some are even reading this blog, right?


2 years go… Signs of times… Tax and cheap… Ever wondered?

A first language dilemma

A friend of mine just went for the IELTS exam as she needed an English qualification for the Masters in an UK university that she is applying. For that particular course she applied, she needed an IELTS score of 7.5 (out of a max of 9) to get in. Do you think it’s tough?

She said it was tough. I did English 1119 during my time so I have no idea how tough IELTS is. Anyway, she managed a 7. To me, that is quite good. Unfortunately for her, that’s not good enough.

She now has 2 options --- she can either re-sit her IELTS or; opt for a telephone interview. Of course, there is the unwritten 3rd option of foregoing her Masters which is not what she wants. She prefers not to do the former as IELTS fees are paid in ₤₤₤. Hence, a re-sit is expensive, very expensive! So the telephone interview sounds like a good escape clause.

But!... there’s always a but…

The telephone interview is only available to those whose first language is English.

My friend is a Chinese, but just like many of us here, she doesn’t read or write Chinese. At home, she communicates with her family members in Cantonese. Certainly, she can declare that English is her first language and the IELTS people should not be able to verify it. I mean, how does one verify such things?

Notwithstanding the above, can she consider English as her first language?

For many of us banana Chinese, we don’t read or write Chinese. But at the same time, most of us are able to converse in a particular dialect. Then, most of us attended national schools where subjects were taught in BM. Not to mention, major exams such as SRP / PMR / SPM / STPM were all done in BM.

From such background, there are some who can then sit at a mamak store under a tree next to the drain drinking cheap coffee but… will converse only in English. And when they head home, the mother will shout…

“Sui chai, kam yeh hui pin to ah?” (Idiot, go where so late?)
“Yum char lah!” (Drink tea lah)

For those who fall within such category but at the same time, have close to perfect command of spoken and written English, perhaps they can safely say that English is indeed their first language.

But for those who can’t read or write Chinese and at the same time unable to construct simple grammatically correct English sentence… unable to remove the “lahs”, “mahs” and “ahs” from their colloquial English, and attended school in BM --- what is our first language? Manglish?

Quite a dilemma, isn’t it?


2 years go… Is the world going faster?

Why you are paying tax for meal allowance

It’s the tax-filing season for individuals and just like any other year; I get calls, e-mails, chat messages, etc. asking for free tax consultation. I am sure some of you know why such queries are directed to me. If not, you should be able to deduce the reason.

Anyway, of the many things they asked me; one thing stood out like sore thumb. Almost everyone asked me…

“Eh Zewt, meal allowance is disclosed in my EA Form? I tot the gomen already announced meal allowance not taxable already. No meh?”

Yes, it was proposed in the national budget last year that meal allowance will be exempt from tax in the hands of individual commencing year 2008 and the law has been gazetted. Yes, that is correct… BUT! There’s always a ‘but’, and this is a big ‘BUT’!

Following this new law on meal allowance exemption by the govt, the income tax dept (which also happened to be govt by the way) issued a new ruling regarding it. In that ruling, it states that…

“Meal allowance provided to an employee for purposes such as overtime or outstation/overseas trips and other similar purposes in exercising his employment… … … …… is chargeable to tax and does not fall within this exemption………”

Source: Second Addendum to Public Ruling No. 1/2006 [Point 3.2.3 (iii)]

Yes, meal allowance is not taxable BUT meal allowance for your overtime and travels are taxable. Please also note that meal allowance for “other similar purposes in exercising your employment” is also taxable. That is a big-ass wide coverage if you ask me.

So what kind of meal allowance is really not taxable? Errr… beats me…

This is what I call… give right pocket, take left pocket.

Ridiculous? Stupid? Brainless? Aiya… this is the land of the best nasi-lemak, best char-kuey-teow and best bak-kut-teh; don’t complain so much lah?


2 years go… What keeps me going

Why specialise

Before I begin, just want to say that the answer for my post last Friday “The fate of 4 slaves” is slave 1 & 3. The truth can be cruel. Why promote people whom willingly sell their soul for the company?

Whenever I talk to a doctor friend or meet a doctor on non-consultation occasion, I always ask them whether they are going to specialise. Some of them already are doing their Masters with cardiology topping the list. For some, they are still deciding on which “logy” to take. For the others, they have tried but couldn’t make it due to some unforeseen circumstances.

Generally, all doctors I’ve met told me they want to specialise… except for 1.

He is the brother of a friend of mine. When I asked my friend whether his brother will specialise, the answer was…

“No, he is not. He doesn’t want to be driven by money”.

He went to explain that his brother wants to help everyone as his brother is of the opinion that being a specialist will limit the scope of his patients. And of course, there is also the noble intention of not being money driven. What do you think of him?

There is no doubt that many perceived specialists as blood suckers. Most of you will know that I spent a lot of time in a few specialist clinics last year. Indeed, their charges are expensive. A 15 minutes conversation may cost you RM100 or more. But certainly, the level of service given to you is quite different.

There are quite a number of doctors who read AZAIG and I am sure they will agree with me when I say specialists will surely want to recuperate the money they spent for getting the qualification. But many will also agree that the line between recuperating money and “sucking blood” can be rather thin.

We are not here to judge, but I think it is important to examine what is the original reason for one to become a specialist.

“Oh man, when you go to SJMC… you see the specialists carpark, it’s filled with sports car and bimmer and all the cars you can dream of! I should have studied medicine!”

That was a comment made by a colleague of mine just last week. Now, if he was to be a doctor and then went on to become a specialist… surely, it is just money. But what about the rest?

If you are a doctor pursuing your masters, are you doing it so that you can really focus on helping specific patients?… or is the monetary reward sitting very significantly at the back of your head?

Jun, Xabi, doc… what say you?


1 year ago… Songs re-engineered

2 years go… A trap on both side… An accent mystery