Are you claiming benefits at the same time as running an eBay business? If so you should of course be declaring your eBay income but it appears some of our Aussie chums down under might have forgotten that eBaying counts as working.
According to AustralianIT, thousands of eBay PowerSellers will now be tracked and checked off against welfare claimants as part of the governments fraud checks. The Australian Department of Human Services will apparently receive a list of PowerSellers with a turnover of more than AUS$20,000 from eBay on an annual basis and be able to check which if any are in receipt of benefits.
When checking in a pilot from 15,000 eBay users they identified about 100 cases and more than AUS$800,000 of welfare claims for further investigation. The pilot has been so successful they’re making it a permanent and central feature of the Australian Government Human Services fraud program.
People using online trading to sell a few unwanted possessions or as a hobby will be left in peace, but if you’re making serious amounts of sales it’s probably (for which read certainly) better to declare your income than wait to be caught.
10 Responses
Benefit fiddlers are a bane to all of us. I would love to see a siimilar clamp down over here.
we ask again does anyone know of or even heard of any results or figures from last years online sellers uk hmrc tax avoidance program,
these things work similer to the police car parked in the hard shoulder to stop speeding, unless your unlucky or daft few are caught, and if everyonebthat was on the fiddle were prosecuted we would need thousands of more courts and prisons
Jimbo, pop down to your local benifit office and spend an hour or so watching works vans pull up and the driver sign on. Don’t believe me, take a serious look.
I am all in favour of a benefits for those that need them, and if those claiming them fraudulently could be stopped then there would be more for those that really need support.
If you don’t think there is a vast number of fiddlers then you don’t seem to be in the same world as me.
The country is in a right mess at the moment and sit at home skivers should have a boot up their arse.
To many people think the world owes them a living. I’m sure you work hard, I know I do and I seriously begrudge carrying lazy buggers who choose not to work.
I would shovel sh## rather than let somebody support me, but perhaps that my generation.