Guyana VAT rate
The single positive rate of value-added tax charged on every taxable supply made in Guyana by a taxable person and on every import of goods or services other than an exempt import. Section 9(1) of the Value-Added Tax Act, Chapter 81:05, does not itself state a rate: it levies the tax 'at a single positive rate to be specified by regulations made by the Minister, which regulations shall be subject to an affirmative resolution of the National Assembly'. The operative rate therefore lives in regulation 2 of the Value-Added Tax Regulations 2005. Administered by the Guyana Revenue Authority.
| Current value | 14 percent |
|---|---|
| In force from | 2017-02-01 |
| Official source | Value-Added Tax Regulations 2005, regulation 2 (Rate of tax under section 9(1) of the Act), as amended by Regulations No. 8 of 2016 — 'The tax imposed under section 9(1) of the Act shall be at a rate of fourteen percent (14%)'; printed in the Value-Added Tax Act, Chapter 81:05 (Act, Regulations, Transitional Regulations) consolidated and reprinted by the Guyana Revenue Authority, revised 27 March 2026 |
| Last verified | 2026-07-23 |
| Verification | primary — No verification limitation recorded — read from the official source cited. |
| Provenance | source fingerprint |
What this value means
14 per cent, cut from 16 per cent as a Budget 2017 measure. Budget Speech 2018 (Ministry of Finance) recites the 2017 package: 'We reduced the marginal rate of the Value Added Tax (VAT) to 14 percent, increased the VAT threshold to $15 million from $10 million and increased the number and range of items that are exempted from VAT.' DATE CAVEAT: the GRA consolidation prints regulation 2 with only the marginal note 'Reg. 8/2016' and NO commencement date, and the Guyana e-Gazette archive does not reach back to 2016, so 1 February 2017 is the commencement as published in the Budget 2017 measures rather than a date this agent read off the instrument — treat the month/year as solid and the day as the soft part. REGISTRATION THRESHOLD: G$15,000,000 (regulation 3, as amended by Reg. 8/2016); below that, registration is voluntary under s. 11(5). ZERO-RATED vs EXEMPT — DO NOT SWAP THE SCHEDULES. Schedule I to the Act lists ZERO-RATED supplies for the purposes of section 17 (exports, basic unprocessed and locally produced food, prescription drugs, water and electricity to domestic consumers, educational services, machinery and equipment for named industries, and — new from 16 February 2026 — locally produced furniture, locally produced jewellery, fire extinguishers and smoke alarms, and security equipment including security cameras and alarm systems). Schedule II lists EXEMPT supplies for the purposes of section 18 (financial services, medical services, residential rent and sale of dwellings, and a long list of specified vehicles — extended from 16 February 2026 to double-cab pickups not exceeding 2,500cc, new vehicles under four years old not exceeding 1,500cc, and hybrid vehicles not exceeding 2,000cc). Both schedule changes were made by section 4 of the Fiscal Enactments (Amendment) Act 2026 (Act No. 3 of 2026, Official Gazette Extraordinary, 17 February 2026), which by s. 1(3) brought the Value-Added Tax Act and Customs Act amendments into operation on 16 February 2026. THE RATE ITSELF WAS NOT TOUCHED by Act No. 3 of 2026, nor by the Fiscal Enactments (Amendment) Act 2025. VAT FRACTION: where a registered person fails to charge the tax, s. 90(1) deems the price to include it and the GRA extracts it at 14/(1+14) = 7/57. ACCESS NOTE: gra.gov.gy serves its PDFs from www.gra.gov.gy/wp-content/uploads/ but its HTML pages 403 some automated clients on first request; the GRA also maintains a plain-language 'VAT Zero and Exempt List' (revised 27 March 2026) at https://www.gra.gov.gy/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/VAT-Zero-and-Exempt-List-Revised-March-27-2026.pdf which is the practical watch target for schedule changes.
Earlier values
| From | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| 2007-01-01 | 16 | Value-Added Tax Regulations 2005, regulation 2 as originally |
Get it programmatically
curl https://latamref.dev/v1/gy/vat
# $0.001 per call — x402 on Base (USDC). No key, no signup.
# History: curl https://latamref.dev/v1/gy/vat/history?from=2020-01-01
# Provenance: curl https://latamref.dev/provenance/gy/vatOther Guyana series: policy interest rate · minimum wage · public holidays · inflation rate (CPI) · corporate tax rate · income tax rates