In July 1st, 2018, the Government and the Parliament of Uganda introduced a tax that requires an excise duty on over-the-top services over the internet. This came immediately following a brief tweet by the President of Uganda, His Excellency Yoweri Kaguta Museveni that “social media encourages gossip”.
The Social media tax or the OTT Tax requires users to pay a tax of UGX 200 per day in order to access over-the-top services or the social networking platforms such as Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, Twitter, Google Hangout, Snapchat, among others. However, mail services like Gmail, Yahoo are not considered as taxable.
Major internet service providers in Uganda have blocked access to these sites and every user must pay first the OTT Tax, on a daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly or on an annual basis in order to access these over-the-top services. Payment are made using mobile money and access previously lasted till midnight but it has been changed to last for 24 hours period from the time of payment. Meanwhile, with Africell Uganda, you can pay for OTT Tax using your airtime account.
Applicable Apps:
| Facetime | Skype | |
| Android Messages | Badoo | |
| New Messenger | Hitwe | |
| Truecaller | Textra | SayHi |
| Google Hangouts | iPair-Meet | |
| Google Allo | WiCall | Tumblr |
| Viber | Kik | |
| Snapchat | InMessage | Chatouts |
| LINE | TrueCaller | Grindr |
| Phone+ | Hi5 | LiveTalk |
| Call Free | Freevideo – Mail.Ru | Zalo |
| Signal | TextMe | Kakao Talk |
| StealthChat | TalkU | Mood |
| Tinder | LOVOO | Google Plus |
| MeetMe | Drupe | |
| Telegram | Imo | BlackBerry Messenger |
| IM+ | Hangouts Dialer | Voxer Walkie Talkie |
| IMessenger | CallerID | Hike |
| Yahoo Messenger | magicApp | Moments |
To access the above Over The Top Applications while in Uganda, you ought to pay a government tax. Choose from the options provided how you would want to pay the OTT tax through Mobile Money based on your service provider.
How does one activate OTT Tax?
Here is the code you can dial and will help you subscribe for the OTT Tax that will give you access to use the social media sites while in Uganda. You can activate it on a daily, weekly, monthly or annual basis.
MTN Uganda
Dial *150*3# select the period that you want. This can be Daily, Weekly, Monthly, Quarterly or Annually.
Africell Uganda
Dial *133*8# select option 1 which is “OTT”. Select the time period that you want. This can be One day, One week, One month, 3 months, 6 months or 12 months.
Airtel Uganda
Dial *185*2# and select option #5 OTT Service Tax. Then select For Myself/For another number. Then select Data ONLY OTT Packs.
If you are experiencing any problem or you have a question, don’t hesitate to contact us or leave a comment below and we will respond to it as soon as possible.
