Local electric car Togg given tax advantage

Hacer Boyacıoğlu - Ankara

Türkiye’s first local car Togg, which is expected to be on the streets in the first quarter of next year, has been given a head start with a law decreasing the Special Consumption Tax (ÖTV) for electric cars of its class.

The tax amount to be collected from electric cars whose engine power does not exceed 160 kW and whose price excluding tax does not exceed 700,000 Turkish liras ($41,000) will be 10 percent, while the tax of those whose price excluding tax exceeds 700,000 liras will be 45 percent, according to the law.

Regarding the cars whose engine power exceeds 160 kW, the ÖTV rate will be 50 percent for those whose price exceeds 750,000 liras ($44,000), and 60 percent for those whose engine power exceeds 750,000 liras.

Considering the new ÖTV rate and the maximum price excluded tax of 700,000 liras, it is estimated that the price of the first C-segment SUV model to be offered by TOGG will be around 908,000 liras ($54,000).

“We aim to protect domestic production by decreasing the ÖTV and making Togg attractive,” said Mustafa Elitaş, the deputy parliamentary group leader of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP).

Before this law, the ÖTV rate of electric cars whose engine power doesn’t exceed 85 kWh was 10 percent, while it was 25 percent for electric cars between 85 kW and 120 kW.

It was 60 percent for the electric cars with an engine power exceeding 120 kW.

Turkey’s locally developed car Togg will appear on the country’s roads starting March 2023, the company’s top executive said in May.

“We have not yet begun collecting orders for the car. There is more time for this. We can discuss this matter at the company’s board in the second half of the year,” Mehmet Gürcan Karakaş, Togg’s CEO said in an event in the northern province of Samsun.

The country’s indigenous car is named Turkey’s Automobile Initiative Group (TOGG). The group plans to manufacture 1 million vehicles in five models by 2030.

With another regulation adopted during the discussions of the omnibus bill in the Turkish parliament, the fines imposed on highways where access control is applied will continue to be paid without penalty for the first 15 days.

However, fines paid five times after 15 days will now only be doubled if they are paid in the period up to 45 days, according to the regulation.

After 45 days, it will be paid five times.