Malaysia removes sales tax from commercial vessels under headings 89.01 and 89.05–89.08

What changed in detail

Two companion instruments, both gazetted 31 July 2026 and effective 1 August 2026, move a set of vessel categories out of Malaysia’s Sales Tax rate schedule. P.U.(A) 281, the Sales Tax (Rate Of Sales Tax) (Amendment) Order 2026, deletes tariff headings 89.01, 89.05, 89.06, 89.07 and 89.08 — ships, tugs, light-vessels, floating docks and other vessels — from the First Schedule of the Sales Tax (Rate of Sales Tax) Order 2025. P.U.(A) 276, the Sales Tax (Goods Exempted From Sales Tax) (Amendment) Order 2026, inserts those same categories, including tankers, refrigerated vessels and other cargo/passenger vessels under 89.01, into the Schedule of the Sales Tax (Goods Exempted From Sales Tax) Order 2025 — plus a separately replaced heading 89.03.

Both orders are published by the Attorney General’s Chambers of Malaysia in the Warta Kerajaan Persekutuan (Federal Government Gazette) and distributed through the Royal Malaysian Customs Department’s MySST portal.

What it means

Read this as a targeted move of specific commercial-vessel headings from taxable to exempt, not a blanket marine exemption. Heading 89.03 — yachts and other pleasure or sporting vessels — is not among the headings deleted from the rate order; P.U.(A) 276 separately replaces the 89.03 entry in the exempted-goods schedule, on terms distinct from the straightforward 89.01/89.05–89.08 deletion covered here. A business should confirm which heading a given vessel actually falls under before assuming sales tax no longer applies. For the headings this record does cover, sales tax should not be charged on supplies or imports from 1 August 2026.