Any way of reducing eBay final value fees?

[wack]

Josho said:

No it's being sent by a tracked courier.

We've marked the engine discreetly on the head, block and sump.

EBay won't care if you get a lump of wood back , when the buyer fits it you could be liable forever if he paid by credit card and starts a credit card chargeback , if I were you I'd cancel the sale and refund the money if you haven't sent it already

If he starts an item not as described case they'll put your account into the red , refund him when he sends the knackered engine back then come chasing you for the money

Whatever you do keep the proof of delivery

[Mandat]

The Spruce goose said:

the morality issues of a company that makes 1.1 billion from the UK but pays 1.1 million tax.

Are there any companies that are charged tax based on their turnover, rather than profit?

[DonkeyApple]

Mandat said:

Are there any companies that are charged tax based on their turnover, rather than profit?

Just us individuals, I'm afraid.

[anonymous-user]

Mandat said:

Are there any companies that are charged tax based on their turnover, rather than profit?

These companies set up offshore systems so as to pay as little tax as possible. It is ironic though that if you try to get around ebay's 'tax' system they take offence....

[RM]

Mandat said:

Are there any companies that are charged tax based on their turnover, rather than profit?

You're missing the point. Their UK accounts showed revenues of £185m, profits of £8m and CT of £1.1m, roughly. They told US investors though that the UK generated revenue of £1.1bn. The difference was siphoned off via Switzerland as "fees".

[ToothbrushMan]

Does ebay provide the audience? The platform is already there granted and its the seller who selects his her audience ie UK EU Worldwide etc.
Most of ebay is automatedwith no human intervention so its not like for your final value fee you get to consult with a nice bloke over the phone who guides you through your sale.

On that basis I have always felt the FSV fees were too high for what they actually physically do for you. Its the captive audience they have that means they dont care if we like the fees or not theyre just being greedy. Make money yes but I feel for this guy who after selling an engine is having to hand over £300 to ebay. £300 notes for what?

And the argument about ebay providing an audience might be right on the one hand but it doesnt bare any relation to the final sale price of an item.

You sell an item for a Pound youre getting no more possibe audience from ebay than you would if you sold an engine for £3000 so why the high fees/removal of the cap?

[northwest monkey]

Josho said:

Buyer wouldn't do anything but go through eBay and PayPal.

I was seriously tempted to say it would be extra but I stuck to my word and lost nearly £300 ??

There is no way as a buyer I'd dream of dealing with a seller that wanted to deal cash outside of Ebay after buying something on Ebay. I send you the cash, you send me nothing, Ebay wouldn't be interested.

You agreed to the fees when you placed the advert.

[K50 DEL]

Gad-Westy said:

Patience is your friend here. Every couple of weeks or so, ebay will have offers on that cap selling fees. Often at only £1. You'll still have paypal fees but they're somewhat easier to stomach.

This is what I do.... I listed a bunch of stuff on a £1 max day a few weeks ago and ended up saving myself several hundred.
Unfortunately there never seems to be offers on the Paypal fees though!

[Mandat]

RM said:

Mandat said:

Are there any companies that are charged tax based on their turnover, rather than profit?

You're missing the point. Their UK accounts showed revenues of £185m, profits of £8m and CT of £1.1m, roughly. They told US investors though that the UK generated revenue of £1.1bn. The difference was siphoned off via Switzerland as "fees".

The point is that Spruce Goose was quoting 1.1million tax paid on 1.1billion turnover, which was totally incorrect on a number of levels.

As you point out, the UK turnover was only 185million and not 1.1billion as SG claimed.

Also, we all know that corp tax is calcualted on profit and not turnover, which SG was being disingenuous about.

We can debate the moral & ethical merits of tax avoidance. I was just pointing out the incorrect claims made by SG.

[Gad-Westy]

K50 DEL said:

Gad-Westy said:

Patience is your friend here. Every couple of weeks or so, ebay will have offers on that cap selling fees. Often at only £1. You'll still have paypal fees but they're somewhat easier to stomach.

This is what I do.... I listed a bunch of stuff on a £1 max day a few weeks ago and ended up saving myself several hundred.
Unfortunately there never seems to be offers on the Paypal fees though!

I think generally though you can expect to get slightly more on ebay than on most items simply because of the bigger audience and the value that people place on buyer protection and feedback. I know from selling a few bits of camera gear in the past, I sometimes got substantially more on ebay than I could have expected selling on forum classifieds and that more than offset the paypal fees.

[AlexRS2782]

Surely the change in cap to the fees, as well as the late October changes to their terms of service regarding use of ebay messaging and selling off eBay to avoid fees and then cancelling listings, is all to do with eBay moving towards being geared for businesses only and slowly phasing out private sellers?

Haven't eBay said many times before that they have long wanted to move towards a predominantly business sellers only / Amazon marketplace and then have the Motors classifieds as a separate entity? I thought that was one of the reasons given for their buyout of Gumtree too? By changing the fees, etc, you slowly start phasing out the private buyers who don't accept the new terms but still make £££ off those private sellers who don't notice / don't care about the changes?

[survivalist]

AlexRS2782 said:

Surely the change in cap to the fees, as well as the late October changes to their terms of service regarding use of ebay messaging and selling off eBay to avoid fees and then cancelling listings, is all to do with eBay moving towards being geared for businesses only and slowly phasing out private sellers?

Haven't eBay said many times before that they have long wanted to move towards a predominantly business sellers only / Amazon marketplace and then have the Motors classifieds as a separate entity? I thought that was one of the reasons given for their buyout of Gumtree too? By changing the fees, etc, you slowly start phasing out the private buyers who don't accept the new terms but still make £££ off those private sellers who don't notice / don't care about the changes?

Possibly out of the loop on this, but why would anyone use eBay over Amazon for anything that isn't either rare or a massive bargain? For anything easily available amazon seems to be easier, as cheap / cheaper but with better delivery and consumer rights...

[Josho]

Buyer received okay and has text saying so so fingers crossed all okay.

Had a win which I put down to good karma on keeping my word which was someone messaged offering the full BIN price of £300 more than this engine sold for.

I only happen to have two more engines. Sent his driver straight round with the full cash.

I stuck on some interior trim and a hub as a thank you very much and everyone's happy.

[V8RX7]

survivalist said:

why would anyone use eBay over Amazon for anything that isn't either rare or a massive bargain?

For anything easily available amazon seems to be easier, as cheap / cheaper but with better delivery and consumer rights...

Speaking as a regular Ebayer and very occasional Amazon user - because the Amazon search is absolutely useless !

Also there is far more variety (in what I look for) with Ebay and IME the prices on Ebay are generally cheaper too.

[K50 DEL]

V8RX7 said:

survivalist said:

why would anyone use eBay over Amazon for anything that isn't either rare or a massive bargain?

For anything easily available amazon seems to be easier, as cheap / cheaper but with better delivery and consumer rights...

Speaking as a regular Ebayer and very occasional Amazon user - because the Amazon search is absolutely useless !

Also there is far more variety (in what I look for) with Ebay and IME the prices on Ebay are generally cheaper too.

Same here, I use Amazon once a year, at Christmas as family often want CDs and DVDs, other than that I'm E-bay all the way, cheaper, easier to find things and a much wider range of stuff.

As a seller though, things are definitely not so rosy... maybe it's time for a new "private individual" oriented site to start-up

[Plate spinner]

V8RX7 said:

I tend to stick my Tel No. in ads - speeds up the process no end

Likewise

[J4CKO]

Depends whether you want to risk getting banned from Ebay, a mate of mine was playing fast and loose like this and he was relying on it for his business, they banned him, they block IP's and stuff as well.

They are a bit greedy though.

[RM]

Mandat said:

The point is that Spruce Goose was quoting 1.1million tax paid on 1.1billion turnover, which was totally incorrect on a number of levels.

As you point out, the UK turnover was only 185million and not 1.1billion as SG claimed.

No, UK turnover was £1.1 billion, as they told US investors.

They only declared £165 million of it in their UK filed accounts.

The EU are considering charging digital based companies a tax on turnover rather than profit, for exactly this reason, according to an article in yesterdays Guardian. Their average tax rate is half that of normal companies.

Edited by RM on Saturday 23 September 13:52

[anonymous-user]

''Online retailer eBay paid just £1.1m in tax in the UK last year, despite telling US investors that Britain was its second largest market, generating revenues of $1.4bn (£1.1bn).'

The company appears to have reduced its tax bill by using a corporate structure that routes advertising fees from hundreds of thousands of British sellers through an overseas company, according to UK filings.

The group’s main UK unit reported revenues of just £185m last year and tax of only £1.1m. Latest accounts for eBay (UK) Ltd, which employs 372 staff, many of them at offices in Richmond, west London, confirm the British subsidiary does not receive a penny of the fees paid by UK sellers that advertise goods on eBay.co.uk.''

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/oct/08/e...

[DonkeyApple]

Pretty much the same mechanism The Guardian uses to offshore its profits and avoid tax. It funnels as much as it can through the Cayman Is.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/gu...

It's also the same mechanism most EU companies use to funnel key revenues through Luxembourg et al.

In terms of the mechanism that EBay uses the UK is in competition with the Netherlands and to keep the jobs and any kind of tax receipt we undercut or match the Dutch.