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I got this wonderful news recently:

 

Quote

 

Effective Jan 1, 2021, value added tax (VAT) must be collected for all goods entering the United Kingdom (UK). 

 

There will be a 20% VAT rate on goods valued up to £135 (about $180 USD), which you must collect unless your online marketplace (e.g. eBay, Amazon, Etsy, etc.) is already collecting it. Current procedures for goods valued over £135 remain the same. 

 

To prevent your UK shipments from being delayed, held, or returned by UK customs in 2021, please take the following steps:  

 

1. Register for a VAT number with the UK:  https://www.gov.uk/vat-registration  

2. Collect VAT at the time of purchase.  

3. Make quarterly VAT return payments to the UK. 

 

 

I decided to register my business with HMRC so that I could continue doing business with my UK customers.

About 2 hours into the frustrating and complicated registration process, ready to quit, I walked away from my computer to clear my head. When I returned the site had refreshed and started me over from the beginning, without having saved my info.

I quit. :bandhead2:

 

I blocked payments from the UK on my website.

 

UK customers will have to order my products through eBay, as soon as I can get a Zactomodels eBay store up and running.

I'll try to have that done ASAP, but do have other obligations.

 

EU is coming next. They will apparently be requiring worldwide businesses to collect and pay them VAT fees starting in July.

 

Eventually small businesses won't be able to survive on their own and will be forced to submit to the mega-corporations...

 

:angry:

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This has already been the subject of anger and frustration here - largely brought to people's attention when eBay listings from everywhere outside the UK all suddenly started showing "+ 20% VAT will apply"...

....and also an article on the BBC News website a couple of weeks ago: EU firms refuse UK deliveries over Brexit tax changes  Although the title mentions Brexit, the overall policy isn't specifically linked to it, other than coming into force immediately after the 'transition period' ended...

 

I forsee some of us going back to the old days, when if we wanted something 'from abroad', we'd ask family or friends there to get and send it to us...

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14 hours ago, Zactoman said:

I got this wonderful news recently:

 

 

I decided to register my business with HMRC so that I could continue doing business with my UK customers.

About 2 hours into the frustrating and complicated registration process, ready to quit, I walked away from my computer to clear my head. When I returned the site had refreshed and started me over from the beginning, without having saved my info.

I quit. :bandhead2:

 

I blocked payments from the UK on my website.

 

UK customers will have to order my products through eBay, as soon as I can get a Zactomodels eBay store up and running.

I'll try to have that done ASAP, but do have other obligations.

 

EU is coming next. They will apparently be requiring worldwide businesses to collect and pay them VAT fees starting in July.

 

Eventually small businesses won't be able to survive on their own and will be forced to submit to the mega-corporations...

 

:angry:

 

You'll still have to go through that process on Ebay in order to sell to customers in the UK. You, me, Fightertown, Phase Hangar, Spruebrothers, and a host of others have all had to stop selling to the UK (at least for the time being anyway). While my line is carried by Hannants, we're still not 100% sure how (or if) this is going to affect wholesale shipments. It sucks 

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10 hours ago, Dave Roof said:

 

You'll still have to go through that process on Ebay in order to sell to customers in the UK...

...While my line is carried by Hannants, we're still not 100% sure how (or if) this is going to affect wholesale shipments. It sucks 

I am reading things differently regarding eBay and may have found some good news for you regarding wholesale.

Please let me know if I am missing something here and provide links if possible.

 

There's a thorough article about all of this here: https://esellercafe.com/how-a-new-vat-rule-from-brexit-now-impacts-every-us-seller-shipping-to-uk-customers/

 

As for selling direct to customers, the problem is only for purchases under £135 (currently $183.44). Over that amount and the customer pays the VAT.

According to that article and links it provides, eBay takes care of VAT for items under £135:

Quote

The good news for sellers is that when online marketplaces like eBay are involved in facilitating the sale, they will be responsible for collecting VAT directly from buyers. This means for packages of £135 or less, eBay will be collecting the VAT from buyers at the point of sale and remitting it to the UK tax authorities. For shipments worth more than this, eBay will not collect the VAT, and existing customs rules will apply - i.e. the buyer will be responsible for paying import VAT.

(from link on previous page: https://www.ebaymainstreet.com/news-events/new-value-added-tax-vat-arrangements-us-sellers-exporting-uk )

 

For your wholesale problems see "B2B" about halfway down.
From that section (assuming Hannants has their own VAT registration):
"If you sell products to a UK business with a VAT registration, you can avoid having to collect the VAT tax and make it the responsibility of the UK business to submit VAT on the order to the UK government."

 

:cheers:

Edited by Zactoman
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14 hours ago, andyf117 said:

I forsee some of us going back to the old days, when if we wanted something 'from abroad', we'd ask family or friends there to get and send it to us...

I don't know the rules on this or shipping items as "gifts", but this might be a nice solution.

 

My current plan for UK purchases:

Under £135: eBay store. eBay charges customer the VAT and eBay does the dirty work of paying VAT to HMRC.

Over £135: Minimum purchase over £135 will be required on my website, assuming I can find a plugin or code snippet to make this work. If not then customers can email me a list and I'll send an invoice.

 

:cheers:

 

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On 1/16/2021 at 2:53 AM, Zactoman said:

I got this wonderful news recently:

 

 

I decided to register my business with HMRC so that I could continue doing business with my UK customers.

About 2 hours into the frustrating and complicated registration process, ready to quit, I walked away from my computer to clear my head. When I returned the site had refreshed and started me over from the beginning, without having saved my info.

I quit. :bandhead2:

 

I blocked payments from the UK on my website.

 

UK customers will have to order my products through eBay, as soon as I can get a Zactomodels eBay store up and running.

I'll try to have that done ASAP, but do have other obligations.

 

EU is coming next. They will apparently be requiring worldwide businesses to collect and pay them VAT fees starting in July.

 

Eventually small businesses won't be able to survive on their own and will be forced to submit to the mega-corporations...

 

:angry:

 

I feel for you Zactoman.

A lot of people seem to think this is to do with Brexit, and in a way it is, but its not really, as the EU will be following suit in a few months time too. The UK just decided to get all the problems ironed out at the same time as Brexit.

All ebay is doing is just slapping 20% on top of what ever your price is and sending that to HMRC, so if your prices include local sales taxes then they will in effect be charged tax twice and you just dont pay any local taxes as it is going to the UK.

 

I cant wait until the summer as each EU country has a different rate of local sales tax and you will have to collect for each country at a different rate.

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