Reported by Chen Yiting – Developed by OpenAI, ChatGPT has recently become an indispensable tool for many people in their daily lives and work. However, starting in May, subscribers to ChatGPT Plus will notice an additional “5% sales tax” on their bills. The previous monthly fee of $20 will increase to $21, leading many to mistakenly believe it is a price hike.

In reality, this fee is a sales tax collected according to Taiwan's Value-added and Non-value-added Business Tax Act. OpenAI is simply following legal procedures and reporting, not imposing an extra charge. For the ChatGPT Plus subscription at $20 (approximately NT$616), the total amounts to $21 (approximately NT$647) including the sales tax. Companies can avoid this sales tax by providing their tax identification number, and users subscribing through the App Store or Google Play will find the sales tax included in the original price, so no additional charges are necessary.

Recently, there has been much discussion online regarding the supposed price increase of ChatGPT. Some users suspect that the price hike is due to the positive reception of the image generation feature. In fact, this adjustment in price is a result of requirements under Taiwanese law, with users just discovering this charge on their bills as OpenAI has only recently completed its tax registration in Taiwan.

This so-called “sales tax” is essentially a personal consumption tax for users, which is typically included in fees for subscriptions to various services or mobile marketplace purchases. Some online guides suggest changing the billing address to a non-tax location to avoid the sales tax, but this action could involve legal risks. Many users advise against trying to save $1 only to face a more significant fine due to legal issues.