Mike is a VAT registered business selling on eBay. When he lists fees are shown VAT free but he says that VAT is still being applied to his eBay invoices.
He’s sent eBay a copy of his VAT registration certificate and now all of listing fees show as VAT free when uploading to eBay in the likes of TurboLister, all final value fees are shown VAT free too. However when his eBay invoices arrives they still have 15% VAT added.
Mike says that he’s spoken to eBay support by telephone and was told that “their back-end system doesn’t appear to be picking-up the fees without VAT”. However they do say that he’ll eventually be refunded. This has been going on since November and he reckons he’s now owed a four figure sum from VAT that shouldn’t have been collected.
This might be a one off isolated case, but are you being charged VAT that shouldn’t be collected? If you’ve given eBay your VAT number and applied for VAT exempt fees then please do let us know if VAT is still appearing on your eBay invoice.
To pay your eBay invoice net of VAT you first need to and then on eBay fees.
While we’re on the subject of VAT, Luxembourg’s VAT rate, the lowest in the EU, is expected to increase in 2015 from 15% to 16%.
6 Responses
Easy way to check is at the top of any ebay invoice it should say “VAT Status: Exempt”
I noticed this a while ago. I entered my VAT number on the page recommended and the next invoices I received didn’t charge VAT. So it worked for me. Now getting a refund on the VAT that I shouldn’t have paid….well that’s a longer problem!!
We changed our VAT Number last year & the eBay invoices still show the old VAT Number & that we’re exempt.
However on the VAT Status page it shows;
VAT Identification Number: GB ………
VAT Status: Pending approval
eBay are aware of our issue & its most likely linked to above
This problem is not isolated to eBay. 2 years ago my VAT number inexplicably ‘fell off’ Amazon’s Seller Central system and for about 4 months all of their fees were charged with VAT. Due to the nature of their complex payment disbursements and vat invoices it wasn’t instantly apparent. I phoned Seller Support Premium and they helped me identify the issue. I had a refund from Amazon to the tune of about 30K.