Do you realise you have to report your ebay earnings to Centrelink?

[joan.lesley]

Had some dealings with centrelink this week and blow me down I have to report my earnings for my HOBBIE every item sold each fortnight. No deductions, if I have something up with FREE postage I have to include the postage  as earnings also. So have had to end all items with FREE postage and alter them before relisting with postage extra, bang goes this ebay Top Seller sh....t.

I am so deflated.

Please beware all you ebay sellers on centrelink/pensioner payments.

[wilk1149]

I better tell them about the five cent piece I found in the ground yesterday

[cmcoins2000]

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@wilk1149 wrote:
I better tell them about the five cent piece I found in the ground yesterday

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Now be honest - it has earned interest since then.

[wilk1149]

Just wondering if I now start to operate an eBay account as a business and with me spending about thirty five hours a week on eBay. If I was to make no sales in that week therefore having no income will I then have to report myself to the employment ombudsman for not meeting minimum wage requirements

[lyndal1838]

Businesses can run at a loss for a certain amount of time (5 years I think) without any repercussions from the ATO and as you would be self employed you do not have an obligation to report underpayment of wages.

Many owners of businesses do not draw a wage until the business is in a position to pay them.

[lane-ends]

Be wary also if you put any contributions into your superannuation and include it on your tax return. Centrelink will class that as reportable "income" so if you are over their threshold they will deduct 50% of that amount from your pension, so you loose that along with the 15% deductions tax ATO tax from super fund. assuming your income is below tax threshold there will be no tax savings for claiming super as a deduction. Net result is you are taking 100% from your bank account, 65% ends up in to the gov hands. Leaving effectively 35% of it in your super.  Even though this is not extra money you have earned but merely attempted to transfer into super. Moral> Do not claim any super contributions as tax deductions  if you are on a pension and earn over pension threshold which is a mighty $150 rep fornight for singles or $275 for couples.

Pension threshold is way too low it puts people off from getting off their butt to try and start doing anything.

[joan.lesley]

Thank you for your reply, I have noted the figures but only put it up in the forum discussion board so others would be aware of my reporting the income from my basically secondhand goods to Centrelink..

Thanks to all who replied.

regards

[dvdezydvds]

I would try selling on qs (don't need paypal so no tracking) same with fb lots of business pages as well as buy,swap,sell sites, don't need paypal for that either. The buyswap sites are usualy cash on pick up and if you have local markets be a stall holder. (Markets are very popular atm, a few weeks ago i sold $750.00 worth at a boot sale from 9 till 3.There is no way i would be claiming anything unless its sold on ebay.

[harley_babes_hoard]

do you not think the ATO have access to your deposits in your bank account. Anything other than cash they can trace these days.

[dvdezydvds]

Which is why you go to woolworths with the cash and put it onto a pre paid debit card, or you just keep the cash at home. 🙂

[pegasusaustralia]

did you mean $7000 net income per year? meaning total sales less expenses (cost of goods sold + postage costs)?

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@hagners-4-u wrote:

when centerlink phoned me 2 years ago ebay had reported me over $20000.00 and they know when i started on ebay 2004 another ID

haw many sales i had each year and amount i sold for each year .luckey i had a copy of eve invoice in the shed .i had to talley each year all 8 years .as i had been on centerlink for the whole time i had to add it all to the ATO been on low income i didnt need to pay any tax but i did have to repay centerlink $1600.00 for one of the years and they took $60 per fortnight for a year as thats what i was earning over there limit .and i have to report evey 3 months you can earn about $7000.00 a year after cost befor they take money from you. i am now sellimg under there limit

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