July 1st No more overseas purchases allowed ????

[hotrodvideo]

Did I hear this right ?...... As reported on 3AW radio this aftternoon , an  Ebay representitive said they will block  Australian buyers from purchasing overseas so that eBay will not have to collect the 10% GST for the Australian government as of July 1st

[digital*ghost]

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@glenbankloel wrote:

Personally think they should be paying tax/vat/gst in whatever country they run a business in. 

(2c)   

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GST is not a tax on businesses or corporations, it is a tax on Australian consumers. 

eBay (and any other business that this affects) will pay absolutely nothing if they have to collect GST, it will just cost Australian buyers an additional 10% (or so - more if they add admin costs) to purchase goods and services from overseas. 

The other e**y site currently collects VAT (a similar tax) on digital goods on behalf of all sellers when they're sold to EU buyers (the VAT is also worked out on the total sale price, meaning when an EU buyer purchases an item, the FVF is charged on the amount after VAT has been added, so it costs those sellers more to sell to EU buyers). They also charge VAT on top of all their seller fees to EU sellers. 

This won't make any OS businesses trading in Australia pay their fair share of tax, it won't bring additional money into Australia, nor (JMHO) will it keep more money in Australia, it will just mean the government gets cash when people do buy from OS, and that money will come exclusively from the buyers. 

[glenbankloel]

Guess it goes back to the old saying, user pays, so if you buy "stuff" so are a consumer, then you will pay GST. Nothing wrong with that. Do think that will ultimately benefit Aust sellers, so that could be good. 

[digital*ghost]

It's possible that it will help some Australian businesses, but I personally think they will be in the minority and the benefit will be minimal.

People buy from overseas for two main reasons - the product either isn't available in Australia, in which case there would be no Aussie business to help, or it's cheaper from overseas, in which case unless the price difference is in the realm of 10%, it will still be cheaper to buy from overseas. 

[hus2385]

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@digital*ghost wrote:

It's possible that it will help some Australian businesses, but I personally think they will be in the minority and the benefit will be minimal.

People buy from overseas for two main reasons - the product either isn't available in Australia, in which case there would be no Aussie business to help, or it's cheaper from overseas, in which case unless the price difference is in the realm of 10%, it will still be cheaper to buy from overseas. 

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Agreed. Not everyone buys items on ebay which are new/commerically readily available, so there is no aussie equivalent. Speaking as a random collector of militaria, it would be extremely rare for Australian sellers to offer the kind of items I've bought from overseas; as geographically we just aren't in the right place for private sellers to have collected many of these kind of goods. That's a whole nother market that people don't necessarily realise exists within ebay. 

[caryns]

This is just going to open a real can of worms. GST is only payable on BRAND NEW items and the argument could easily be made that what you are buying in a lot of cases is 2nd hand and therefore GST is not applicable. I buy a lot of clothes from America because of the lack of choice in plus-sizes here and 90% of the time the clothes are second-hand.

[lyndal1838]

GST is payable on second hand items as well as new items.

[davewil1964]

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@springyzone wrote:

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@hotrodvideo wrote:

Did I hear this right ?...... As reported on 3AW radio this aftternoon , an  Ebay representitive said they will block  Australian buyers from purchasing overseas so that eBay will not have to collect the 10% GST for the Australian government as of July 1st

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Now that would be interesting.

I suppose on the bright side, if overseas sellers are blocked from advertising on Australian ebay, it would give local sellers a bit of a boost in visibility and from a buyer's point of view, I wouldn't care if some of the Chinese ads disappeared.

Will it make me buy more from ebay though? Nope, not at all.

I don't buy much from overseas on ebay anyway but I like to have some options. There's still always aliexpress I suppose.

I would have thought if ebay could block overseas purchases, they could easily implement a computer program that just added 10% to overseas purchases and that could go into an ebay GST account. I guess it may mean only buy it now/instant payment purchases from overseas could be shown though.

I can see why ebay wouldn't fancy the extra work. Not sure why the govt is doing it this way, surely it would be easier to just have GST kick in above a certain level eg over $200.

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Who have also threatened to use the eBay route as well, I believe

[phorum_junkie*]

Here in the UK VAT is collected on imported items over a very low sum but it is the buyer who pays and the money is collected by whoever makes the delivery be it Royal Mail or a courier company. Neither the company sending the goods or any third party facilitating the deal are involved.

If it is going to be the responsibility of ebay to collect (not pay, that will always be the buyer) the GST then I can well see how they would just throw the towel in and block overseas purchases. The administrative cost would be so much it woould mean fees increasing to an unsubstainable level.

[brerrabbit585]

Plenty of other sites have already set things up to collect VAT for Europe (not just etsy, but Amazon, etc) so it shouldn't take much effort to ebay to implement it for the GST.  Rather than re-inventing the wheel, they could buy the software from another site that's already done it and just modify it to suit.

I can't see ebay blocking overseas sales - all it'd do is drive buyers away from ebay and to other websites, and I'm sure that's not what they want.  If they think they can blackmail the govt by refusing to collect GST then they need to switch their brains on.

[davewil1964]

You're assuming the people who make the decisions have brains. On past performance that is not a guarantee, at least as far as Australia is concerned.

Admittedly, past performance does not guarantee future performance. Trends do tend to be indicative, though.