Netflix tax

[stickerswa]

Just got an email from ebay...

From 1 July 2017, Goods and Services Tax (GST) will apply to fees on eBay.com.au, due to new legislation in Australia (the "Netflix Tax").

Businesses registered for GST will not be affected by this change if you register your Australian Business Number (ABN) with eBay here.

Anyone else feel a fee increase coming to cover this....

[bluebudgies]

---

@thereallygoodbookshopcomau wrote:

Sorry Digital-Ghost, it's not really as simple as ebay not charging it at all.  This is as simple as I can explain it.  For BAS we total up total of our sales that include GST (everything that we sell within Australia) and that gets divided 1/11th gives us the GST we collected. But GST-free sales and export sales are separate as they don't have GST of course.  Then we add up all the GST we paid on our purchases (which will include the ebay fees) and we take that amount away from the GST we have collected giving us a total of what we owe the Tax Office.

So by the time the end consumer buys a retail product they pay 10 percent GST total.  All the businesses along the way pay GST too but they claim the portion they paid back and essentially only pay GST on their added on margin at BAS time for want of a better term.

This is where I get confused, because if a GST registered business claims an exemption from ebay for the GST on the fees, how will that be accounted for at BAS time as you haven't paid for it on your 'purchases' etc but I cannot see that any business is actually exempt from being charged the GST on these fees now unless they are based overseas. 

Is the GST business registration only applicable to businesses not based in Australia but sell on eBay Australia?  That might be why we cannot register with an Australian ABN.  Just sayin....

---

If a business buys something from someone who isn't registered for GST they can't claim any GST for it on their BAS statement.  That works out exactly the same as if you're exempted from paying GST on services supplied by ebay.  As an example, if I cleaned for a business and was on contract rather than receiving wages, but I wasn't registered for GST, the business wouldn't be claiming any GST back because they wouldn't have paid it in the first place.  All they could claim would be my fees as a business expense.

It's a while since I've filled in a BAS statement but I have a feeling there was a space where you filled in purchases that didn't include GST, but if it's not there on the form it doesn't need to be because if you didn't pay GST on it the govt doesn't need to know about it (as far as GST is concerned) because you can't claim any gst back anyway.  The govt is simply streamlining it so that you can be exempted from paying it instead of paying it and then getting it back - much more efficient!

[digital*ghost]

---

@thereallygoodbookshopcomau wrote:

Sorry Digital-Ghost, it's not really as simple as ebay not charging it at all. 

---

It is, because the rules are different when it comes to an international company (eBay) now being required to collect GST.

Busines to business transactions are exempt if both businesses are registered to collect GST, and eBay seems to have gone for the simplified version, which means they don't have to collect GST from GST registered businesses, but they can't claim any of the GST they might pay on goods and services in Aus (which is likely very minimal) as input credit.

For Australian GST-registered businesses using eBay in a business capacity, the buyer is considered the end consumer of eBay's services, not the seller. 

[bluebudgies]

What happened to my post? it was the first post on page 10. There was absolutely nothing in it that was offensive. Ebay glitch maybe? I'm not talking about post on page 9 that's still there.

[thereallygoodbookshop]

Okay, I have worked it out (by ringing my accountant) 🙂 and I see now it is in the  'I accept and agree' tick box when you go to ebay to register.   So I understand now.  When you are registered for GST ebay are asking you to accept that we pay the GST on the 'reverse charge' rule'.  So you still end up paying GST at  BAS time anyway.  It didn't see that in the small print before.  And I just tried to register and now it accepts me so the ebay techs have been hard at work sorting it out it seems.  All sorted.

[ozstockman]

I have received a follow up call fro eBay. They have appologised for the problem with the page, asked for my ABN and promissed to fix that page.

[ozstockman]

Ok, here is a solution for registering on that page. It does not work in Chrome but it works at least in IE. Not sure about Firefox though, ebay says it will work in Firefox too.

I could register by using Internet Explorer with my ABN number.

[jfmgray]

---

@bluebudgies wrote:

---

@jfmgray wrote:

The way I read eBay's new fee table, the GST is only being applied to FVFs - including FVF for postage.  It does not seem to be applied to listing fees, store fees and eBay postage labes.

---

If you read the new rate table again you'll see that in the headings down the left side it says the private seller fees are GST inclusive, but the business seller fees are GST exclusive, ie. GST will be added on to the fees in the table.  They'll have done it that way because businesses can be exempted if they're registered for GST.  They've called all the store packages Business Sellers.

I don't know how much insertion fees currently are when you've already used your free listing entitlements but the new rates show as $1.65 and $3.85 so I'd say they're currently $1.50 and $3.50, which means GST has been added to listing fees for non-store sellers.  

I can't see anything about postage labels but they're not really an ebay fee - they're just collecting the money on behalf of AP.

---

Yep you are correct.  All store owner fees in the table exclude GST, and the GST will be added at invoice time unless you register your ABN.  Like some, I have an ABN but are not registered for GST so will not be recording my ABN on eBay. 

[bluebudgies]

I can't remember whether it was you that mentioned the tiny writing in their table, but if you hover the mouse over the lower right corner of the page you'll see a zoom button so you can get a closer look.

[kestypes]

@That was exactly what I thought. Address was @reply.ebay.com.au. Logo colours were different, and no notification within the ebay site. 

---

@brumby45 wrote:

Just got the same email..Not convinced that it is genuine.Didn't name me in the introduction as all ebay emails do.

---

[davewil1964]

It is legit.

Which part of @ebay.com.au do you think doesn't relate to ebay.com.au?

It is all well and good to be cautious, but you can't claim lack of knowledge if you ignore legitimate communications. The last bit of any URL is the relevant bit - ebay.com.au belongs to eBay Australia. Any phisher who uses that will only direct people to eBay. Hardly productive from their (the phishers')point of view.