Plans to tax us for selling on eBay. What do you think?

Under the rules set out by the OECD, firms will not be asked to share data about sellers who make fewer than 30 transactions or €2,000 (£1,735) a year.

30+ sales may trigger an investigation, but my sales wouldn't reach £1,735 p.a. (unwanted possessions, ornaments, clothes, etc).
I hope any investigations by hmrc would take into account that folk were private sellers - selling unwanted possessions V business sellers 🤔.

Current rules allow people to earn £1000 from eBay sales tax free so most sellers will not be affected.
I think the idea is to ensure that people who make a living out of eBay selling will pay tax appropriately.

The platforms don't distinguish whether the sellers are selling personal items or are online traders. This means that you may have to provide proof that what you are selling is personal.

There are thousands of people doing online trading who don't declare their profits.

In the past HMRC have visited car boot sales to check on traders and may still do so.

Every body should pay the correct amount of but HMRC should be concentrating on doms and tax evasion schemes.

Sure you can only be taxed on profit and if selling ones own clothes/ belongings these would most likely be for less than the price paid..
OK I know there may be (lucky) exceptions like Granny's Clarice Cliff teapot, but can you pay tax on a loss ?

RosiesMaw

Sure you can only be taxed on profit and if selling ones own clothes/ belongings these would most likely be for less than the price paid..
OK I know there may be (lucky) exceptions like Granny's Clarice Cliff teapot, but can you pay tax on a loss ?

No.

If you earn over the tax limit, yes you should.
Many small companies use eBay as a selling platform.

I thought it meant that a seller would be taxed on their earnings from selling on eBay. However if the items sold are secondhand, how would the earnings be calculated?

I have a friend who has made selling on Ebay a business and makes a good living from it. She buys from charity shops and car boot sales and then resells. I admire her entrepreneurship, however as it is a business, she should be paying tax, but I know that she doesn't.

Any business is taxed on the profit or earnings ie selling price minus the cost of producing or buying the product.

You will need to be operating at a very high level as a private seller to reach the limits, probably having to put something on ebay every day to breech the limits.

If you have the income, you should pay the tax, Why shouldn't you?

i don't see how whether the item is second-hand should make any difference.
however i freely admit my ignorance of most things financial, let alone fiscal !
as for concentrating on the doms, what about the subs ?

It’s not ‘stingy’ or ‘controlling’, OP. A lot of people make a lot of money selling on sites such as eBay and don’t declare it. If everyone paid the correct tax we would be much better off. Not declaring all your income, from whatever source, is tax evasion - a criminal offence.

Germanshepherdsmum
I was thinking about people selling a few of their own items. The newspaper article made it sound as though those selling a few ornaments were going to be investigated. That did sound over the top when there are wealthy businesses not paying anything, or finding loopholes to avoid paying.

Of course people shouldn't break the law. I wasn't advocating anything like that.

Good that Airbnb are having to comply.

Will it include people selling items on Facebook market place too. There are lots of small businesses selling item on there as well.

Germanshepherdsmum

It’s not ‘stingy’ or ‘controlling’, OP. A lot of people make a lot of money selling on sites such as eBay and don’t declare it. If everyone paid the correct tax we would be much better off. Not declaring all your income, from whatever source, is tax evasion - a criminal offence.

This, agreed 100%. I know several people who do this as early retirees, and pay no tax.

I'm sure a lot of people will be quite worried, especially people who have been selling and making profit for years, Ebay will have records going back for years and years so if the Tax man cometh!

maddyone

I thought it meant that a seller would be taxed on their earnings from selling on eBay. However if the items sold are secondhand, how would the earnings be calculated?

If you are genuinely selling your own property then there should be no tax to pay, unless you discover that you have a Constable in your attic in which case you would have to pay CGT.

Well that’s good to know. So the taxman won’t be after us for selling my mum’s wheelchair and walker on eBay. I think we sold them for less than £100 for the two. I’ve never sold anything else on eBay. I’m glad someone else can have the benefit of them.

If someone generates an income they should pay tax just like anyone with a job or a pension
A tax payer will ultimately have to pay more to cover those who don’t contribute to the costs of society

Gwyllt I am in total agreement

I think that if people are buying and selling they should pay tax, as that is no different from running a shop. Someone selling their own possessions to raise money is rather different though, but I’m not sure how eBay or HMRC will know the difference.

Selling personal possessions does not normally attract tax, there are exceptions, art and antiques is one that would attract CGT, others too.
It’s easy to identify those that are selling commercially using EBay to make money, catching up with them is another matter because they disappear and set up another account and carry on. It’s far too easy to set up a company in the UK.