According to one brand executive, people seem unaware of the upcoming price increase in pickup trucks despite the news earlier this month. They expected a frantic June like in December 2017 before TRAIN Law was effective from January 2018 onwards. Maybe it’s the wording of titles, jargons, or just getting buried in the news of impeachment drama. Whatever the case, pickups are now not exempted from excise tax and that means price increase.
President Bongbong Marcos signed the Capital Market Efficiency Promotion Act (CMEPA) or Republic Act No. 12214 last May 29, 2024 and it will be effective on July 1, 2025. It encourages ordinary Filipinos to invest in Philippine capital markets. It also clarified that hybrid vehicles will be subject to 50% of excise tax rates while pure battery-electric vehicles will have 0% tax. In this clause too, pickups were removed from the excise tax exemption.
Pickups were not included in the TRAIN Law in 2018. The justification was, they are being used by entrepreneurs in their livelihood, thus helping the economy. The Department of Finance talked about removing this as early as 2022 when they noticed pickups were being used more for leisure than livelihood. Personally, the observation might be limited in Metro Manila because if you go to any province, you’ll see pickups really hauling cargo as they’re meant to be. But that doesn’t matter now as the provision was removed and the law already signed.
This means that pickups priced up to PHP 600,000 will have 4% tax, PHP 600,000 but below PHP 1 million will have 10% tax, PHP 1 million but below PHP 4 million will have 20% tax, and 50% tax for those above PHP 4 million pesos.
Top of the line variants like the Toyota Hilux GR-S and Ford Ranger Raptor might see an increase in hundreds of thousands of pesos. Pricing is more complicated for the likes of the BYD Shark and Changan Hunter which are pickups but also hybrid vehicles.
Classification will also be nit-picked for sure. Pickups like the Toyota Hilux and Isuzu D-Max have single-cab versions that aren’t really being used for leisure. The Toyota Tamaraw, too, has a dropside version that can be classified as a pickup, despite being created for businesses.
I’ve talked to representatives of some of these brands and they’re all saying the same thing – they’re waiting for the Implementing Rules and Regulations (IRR). They need it to know which vehicles will be affected (because of the trucks – pickups technicalities) before they release a new pricing scheme.
