Global Blue - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Global Blue is a financial services

Financial services

Financial services refer to services provided by the finance industry. The finance industry encompasses a broad range of organizations that deal with the management of money. Among these organizations are credit unions, banks, credit card companies, insurance companies, consumer finance companies,...

company headquartered in Nyon

Nyon

Nyon is a municipality in the district of Nyon in the canton of Vaud in Switzerland. It is located some 25 kilometers north east of Geneva's city centre, and since the 1970s it has become part of the Geneva metropolitan area. It lies on the shores of Lake Geneva, and is the seat of the district of...

, Switzerland

Switzerland

Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....

. Global Blue (at the time Global Refund) was acquired by Barclays Private Equity

Barclays Private Equity

Barclays Private Equity is the Private Equity division of Barclays Capital, the Investment Banking arm of Barclays plc. BPE have seven offices across four countries. Started in 1982 they have invested in over 350 businesses including Admiral Group and Dial-a-Phone. Typically €500m is invested per...

in 2007.

Global Blue works with more than 270,000 affiliated merchants (retailers, hotels, restaurants, etc.), and banks

Banks

Banks or The Banks may refer to:* Bank, a financial institution- Placenames :Australia* Banks, Australian Capital Territory, a suburb of Canberra...

worldwide; it employs more than 1,200 people in 40 countries .

The company is best known for Tax-free shopping

Tax-free shopping

-Introduction:Tax-Free Shopping allows shoppers to reclaim the VAT /GST they have paid on their shopping in foreign countries. Promoting the tax rebate and making it easier for tourists to claim it back, has helped to attract travellers to many countries...

, a VAT

Vat

Vat or VAT may refer to:* A type of container such as a barrel, storage tank, or tub, often constructed of welded sheet stainless steel, and used for holding, storing, and processing liquids such as milk, wine, and beer...

(value added tax)/GST

GST

-Computing:* Generalised suffix tree, a tree-like data structure* GNOME System Tools, part of the GNOME desktop environment* GNU Smalltalk, an implementation of the Smalltalk language* GST Computer Systems, a group of companies based in Cambridge, England...

(goods and services tax) refund product

Product

- Business :*Product , an item that ideally satisfies a market's want or need**Product , a deliverable or set of deliverables that contribute to a business solution**Nanoproduct, a product that has been enhanced with nanotechnology...

. Tax free shopping was first introduced in 1980 in Sweden

Sweden

Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....

. Today out of the 130 countries that have a VAT/GST regulation

Regulation

Regulation is administrative legislation that constitutes or constrains rights and allocates responsibilities. It can be distinguished from primary legislation on the one hand and judge-made law on the other...

, about 50 offer VAT/GST refund for tourists . Global Blue introduced a dynamic currency conversion

Dynamic currency conversion

Dynamic Currency Conversion or Cardholder Preferred Currency is a financial service in which holders of credit cards have the cost of a transaction converted to their local currency when making a payment in a foreign currency. Currently this feature is only possible for Visa and MasterCard networks...

service in 2001; dynamic currency conversion allows international travellers to pay for purchases abroad in their payment card’s currency.

The company also informs and advises merchants on international shopping trends and is cited by international and national media including the Financial Times

Financial Times

The Financial Times is an international business newspaper. It is a morning daily newspaper published in London and printed in 24 cities around the world. Its primary rival is the Wall Street Journal, published in New York City....

, Bloomberg

Bloomberg L.P.

Bloomberg L.P. is an American privately held financial software, media, and data company. Bloomberg makes up one third of the $16 billion global financial data market with estimated revenue of $6.9 billion. Bloomberg L.P...

, City A.M.

City A.M.

City A.M. is a free, business-focused newspaper distributed in and around London in the United Kingdom. It was launched by a group of entrepreneurs in September 2005 and remains independent of any other media company. Its certified distribution hit a new record of 113,348 copies a day in November...

, China Confidential and The Times

The Times

The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...

.

The Hurun Wealth Report includes Global Blue data that shows the average spending of outbound Chinese was $1,026 – making them the biggest tax free shoppers in the world for the first time.

Global Blue is a certified supplier of the China Outbound Tourism Quality Service Certification program . The China National Tourism Association and China Association of Travel Service have given Global Blue the authority to certify its merchants who meet the criteria of the China Outbound Tourism Quality Service Certification Program.

The Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore

Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore

The Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore is a statutory board under the Ministry of Finance of the Singapore Government in charge of tax collection.-History:...

selected Global Blue to operate Singapore’s new Tourist Refund Scheme .

The Australian Customs and Border Protection Service chose Global Blue as the payment supplier for tax free shopping in Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

, allowing travellers to reclaim the excise they’ve paid while shopping in Australia.

Recent Events

Barclays Plc., The equity group that owns Global Blue, is considering selling the business, and is supposedly searching for buyers, including several Investment banks. The estimated results of the sale, care of Barclays Private Equity division, could be as much as $1.3 Billion USD

External links

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