Tax return question. Shipping label cost from "listing sales report" not adding up, schedule C

[crudeknives]

This year I was able to do my taxes for schedule C on Amazon and etsy fairly easy. eBay on the other hand has been a complete nightmare. There are so many different sales reports. The numbers do not add up. I am trying to calculate my shipping cost for the entire year. I ship with both UPS/FEdex and USPS. 

I am going off the "listing sales report" from the "Performance - Sales" tab on ebay. 

For example, for one large product (lets call it a portable stove model 1x2b ) I sell where most of the orders are shipped using UPS / FEDEX. The shipping cost only total to about $1000 when I know for a fact it should be at least $2500 (for a total of 103 unit sold)

Anyone have any idea why the numbers are not adding up from the listing sales report ? Is there a better way to calculate shipping cost for all of your sales ? 

[dq3141]

Is that report showing you what the buyers paid?

[jrkirk]

We use an excel spreadsheet to record all related costs to a transaction, including shipping costs, at the time we print the shipping label. We do this because we also have had problems making those costs reconcile using eBay's monthly statements and reports. We used to use PayPal's monthly reports, and that worked fine, but with eBay MP's, the numbers don't seem to be verifiable, or at least, that is how it seems to us. Using excel to record costs for each individual transaction, works for us, and it is easy to add up for any period of time, or for any particular cost category, such as shipping.

[babclassics]

Yeah, I had the same issue.  If you use only the listing sales report, it shows how much the buyer paid for shipping, tax, and the item. Either zero (for free shipping).  Or the amount they paid to you to ship.  The actual amount that YOU paid for shipping is shown under  Payments / Invoices / Dec 2021 tax invoice.  There is one for each month.  That monthly tax invoice is a good place to get all your actual expenses for fees and shipping labels.  If you add up all those expenses in those 12 reports plus your cost basis for the items sold, that is your total to get "cost of goods sold".

[crudeknives]

Yes I've been looking at those invoices also. They seem to be FEDEX and UPS labels only. 

Maybe the column "Shipping labels cost (Amount you paid to buy shipping labels on eBay)" on the "listing sales report" is for USPS labels only ? I will need to check this further . 

[m60driver]

Ebay generated reports are useless for tax purposes so you need to keep your own spreadsheets.  Small sellers like myself can just use Google sheets but larger sellers should use something more comprehensive like QuickBooks.

[pewpew123]

i do that too, but the issue is that if you use ebay shipping the quoted fedex/ups price is almost never the price you actually end up paying. there is usually a $1-2 difference from the original amount quoted when printing the label. so you have to go back a few days after the item is accepted by the courier and see what you were actually charged. 

[crudeknives]

It looks like last year I was able to use the shipping cost from "listing sales reports" for USPS labels. The UPS and FEDEX shipping cost would be included under "Supplemental Shipping Fees" from Invoices. Both of those cost combined would be the total shipping cost for the year. 

Last year we dealt with the transition from paypal to Managed payment system and it looks like they are still constantly changing their reporting style.

[dbfolks166mt]

     If you run a customized report for the year using the Payments Report tab and set the dates from 1 January to 31 December you will get a generated report that includes all the financial information related to your eBay transactions for the year. You can customize the report and rack and stack the data anyway you wish. The report also includes the actual cost of the label you purchased as long as it was through eBay. Sample shot of the information below after I tweaked the data a bit. 

[dbfolks166mt]

     I have actually found the eBay reports you can create to be extremely helpful for tax preparation purposes. the reports are much more detailed than the ones I have to pull from other third party financial processors. I save the report in an EXCEL spreadsheet and tweak it to what I am comfortable with. That usually involves putting the data into several tabs for revenue, fees, shipping and other expenses. Of course I have to combine this with the other expenses I have outside of the eBay report such as POV, packing materials, etc. 

[luckythewinner]

I use the transaction report under Payments > Reports. 

I export it as CSV, import it into a spreadsheet, and calculate the totals myself.   

I would never use an eBay calculation - I always do the math myself. 

[babclassics]

Regarding USPS cost from my previous answer.  Sorry, I forgot that actual USPS label cost is pretty much the only thing that does not appear on the "tax invoice" to calculate actual final total eBay fees and label costs.  So you do have to get USPS label cost from another report, correct.  No idea why eBay leaves only that fee out of the tax invoice, if that was in the tax report we could use just a single report for all expenses.  Note that expenses that are easy to miss like monthly fee,  foreign shipping charges, advertising fees, etc. are all there and easier to take in and not miss any.

The most important reason I mentioned getting FedEx label cost from the "tax invoice" is because FedEx and UPS label cost are NOT fixed at the time you print the label (as was mentioned a few replies  back). So if you save the sales record at the time of sale, the true final cost will not be reflected.  It can change a lot from what was estimated on the label print screen. It normally takes 1 to 2 weeks from the actual true FedEx cost after they are in possession and weigh and measure the package.  That is why you have to wait about 1 to 2 weeks into the next selling month to report on and know the final shipping charge.

The tax invoice always has the true full FedEx and UPS cost and does not show on there until it has been billed back from the carrier. The sales record and label print screen can be way off and could account for some of your lower that actual charges being reported?  For example if the package is 50.1 pounds there is a $26 heavy charge added.  So if you weight it at 49.9 and they weigh it at 50.1 that tax invoice will show the final cost go up by $26.

It is a mess,  I need to merge 3 different reports (some month by monty) to pull in all the numbers.  And as has been said, the formats have changed several times in 2021, plus the format changed from PayPal to MP if you were switched over this year.

[crudeknives]

Yes I only buy labels from ebay. I did make the report from that Payment Report tab and I do not see USPS like your photo there. The only shipping charges are "UPS Shipping Label Fee" and "FedEx Shipping Label Fee".

I charge the USPS shipping labels purchased through ebay through my credit card so I can earn cashback. I wonder if thats the reason it won't show up on the report. 

[jrkirk]

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@babclassics wrote:

Yeah, I had the same issue.  If you use only the listing sales report, it shows how much the buyer paid for shipping, tax, and the item. Either zero (for free shipping).  Or the amount they paid to you to ship.  The actual amount that YOU paid for shipping is shown under  Payments / Invoices / Dec 2021 tax invoice.  There is one for each month.  That monthly tax invoice is a good place to get all your actual expenses for fees and shipping labels.  If you add up all those expenses in those 12 reports plus your cost basis for the items sold, that is your total to get "cost of goods sold".

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A related problem is the promotional expenses from eBay, which are not always reported promptly at time of sale. This makes reconcilling for tax purposes difficult, if not impossible. That is why we just use our own excel spreadsheet, and keep our own records. We have checked monthly totals against eBay's numbers, and they are close, so will just our own expense record for tax purposes. And if you sell in more than one venue, it makes it easy to include other venue expenses as well into your total expenses.

[jrkirk]

Looks like it is up to each seller to find a workable solution that works for them, and their accountant. Our tax person likes what we do with our excel spreadsheet, which shows individual sales, and individual expenses, and we have been able to adapt that to eBay's reporting methodology, so we will continue with our system.