Taxes and Government fee charged to me instead of the buyer?

[astrbac]

Hi all,

I recently sold an old film camera for 230 EUR to a buyer from New Zealand. It was sold on the eBay.com site and I live in European Union country. I believe I was wrongfully charged some "Tax and Government fee".

The sales breakdown is as follows:

• Total sales: 264.41 EUR;
• Taxes and government fees: 34.49 EUR;
• Total selling cost: 53.93 EUR;
• Net sales: 175.99 EUR;

How is this possible? I earned 175 EUR instead of 230 EUR minus eBay fee (13%) which should be 200 EUR.

I have two more cameras worth about 1,000 EUR each, I am not willing to gamble and put these up for sale without understanding what went wrong here. 

Many thanks!

Alex

[inhawaii]

You should know what the fees are BEFORE you sell something.

Simply adjust (raise) your item price and what you charge the customer for shipping to cover these fees.

That way it's the CUSTOMER paying the fees, not you. 

[soh.maryl]

Still back at wondering why it would have been sold on eBay.com when you're in Croatia and your buyer is in New Zealand.  

[lacemaker3]

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@soh.maryl wrote:

Still back at wondering why it would have been sold on eBay.com when you're in Croatia and your buyer is in New Zealand.  

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eBay.com is used by many sellers who don't have an eBay website based in their own country. It is often regarded as "eBay International" and is also the primary website used by many buyers, because of this.

[lacemaker3 · Accepted solution]

@astrbac,

I think that there is some confusion caused by currency conversion here. Your listing was sold for US$ 230.00 because it was listed on eBay.com, which operates in US$, not Euros. So all of the amounts would be calculated in US$, but your payout would have been converted to Euros when you received it.

Because you are not registered as a business seller, eBay is required to collect VAT on the eBay fees for the services they provided to you, which is sent to your country Croatia as required by law.

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https://www.ebay.com/help/selling/fees-credits-invoices/frais-pour-les-vendeurs-particuliers?id=4822...

Other terms and conditions

• ...
• Depending on the tax legislation of your country of residency, local Value Added Tax (VAT), Goods and Services Tax (GST) or similar consumption tax might apply in addition to your eBay fees

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This is how the fees would have been calculated, based on the information you have provided. The total payout would have been about US$ 186.99, which is equivalent to about 175 EUR at recent conversion rates.

PAYMENT:		amount:	calculated on:  (comments)
purchase price		$ 230.00
shipping cost		$          -	(cost from Terapeak)
subtotal		$ 230.00
sales tax	15.0%	$    34.41	subtotal  (New Zealand GST)
total payment		$ 264.41
FEES & DEDUCTIONS:
variable final value fee	12.9%	$    34.11	total payment
fixed final value fee	$     0.30	$     0.30
total eBay fees		$   34.41
VAT on selling fees	25.0%	$     8.60	eBay fees (Croatia VAT)
sales tax		$   34.41	(sent to buyer's country)
shipping label		$          -	(if purchased with available funds)
total deductions		$   77.42	(total eBay fees + sales tax + shipping label)
PAYOUT:
payout sent		$ 186.99	(total payment - total deductions)

[astrbac]

THANK YOU lacemaker for such a clear and quick reply, much appreciated! 🙂 

It is absolutely ridiculous that they charge my domestic VAT. I am not a business and this was a (well) used second hand item. I understand that I am actually "buying eBay services" which are new and certainly not "used" so to speak, so I understand where this VAT comes from.

What if I had sold my used Mercedes for say 50.000 $? If I work out the agreement with the buyer via email for example, my country would not charge me anything. But if I do it via eBay, since the cost of the car is quite hight, I would have to pay huge VAT for "buying" eBay service for this transaction.

This is ridiculous.

Maybe I could have avoided this by listing my item on eBay.uk or eBay.de? Would the New Zealander have found the item in their search results in that case (do the results from local eBay versions appear in global eBay site results)?

[lacemaker3]

@astrbac,

eBay is required to collect VAT on their fees BECAUSE you are not a business. As I understand it, if you were registered as a business, then you would have to take care of your VAT reporting requirements yourself, and in that case eBay is not required to do it for you.

This is because you live in the EU. It doesn't matter what eBay website you sell on. If you don't want to be charged VAT on the fees, then I believe you would need to register a business account.

Selling vehicles on eBay is different. The laws about selling and paying taxes on vehicles are very different from most other kinds of merchandise. For that, you should list the vehicle on the closest eBay website to where you are located, to reach local buyers. I don't know what the rules are for charging VAT on fees for selling vehicles in the EU.

Your buyer in New Zealand probably found your item because they were searching on eBay.com. That is the "local" eBay website for the USA, because it is based in the USA, there is no "Global" eBay site, not really. However, eBay.com is closest thing there is to a "Global" eBay website, and most sellers and buyers who don't have their own eBay websites do use eBay.com.

[kebu-4475]

New Zealand has a VAT  (GST) rate of 13% so with the calculations done on that too, it seems like 26.46 just for that. Unless eBay only charges that on fees I'm not sure.