Ebay Sales Tax?

littlerock

littlerock

Love is Love is Love
O.G.
Apr 19, 2007
21,588
137
#1
I know.. it's probably been covered but my search is not bringing it up. If I'm re-selling an item that i already paid tax on, and I am losing money, why is that item being taxed again? Even if the buyer is paying, that digs into what I can recoup. What is the logic in this?

Please help me understand. Can I show an original receipt (aka money lost) and tax ALREADY paid for this item?
 
#4
Any online sale is taxed, and eBay finally caved to State pressure. It actually doesn’t affect what you recoup at all - the buyer pays the tax, you don’t ever see it or pay fees on it.

ETA: You should have heard me the first time I bought an item from Japan and had to PAY SALES TAX ON IT, which eBay took. I wonder if they actually send the money to the states. Somebody should do an audit. LOL.
 
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#6
Here you go:

Buyer paid tax. My fault??

I don't sell on Ebay much anymore at all, but want to get rid of a couple small pieces. I received a reasonable offer on a LV bracelet so I accepted their offer. I got notification of payment this morning and they were charged sales tax. They're in a different state, so this makes no sense to...
forum.purseblog.com forum.purseblog.com
 
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#8
Thanks you guys. So my sale was an LV and the taxes were nearly 300 making it more expensive for my buyer. She wants to cancel sale. I canceled sale in ebay but when I go to paypal it's really confusing. It offers me to refund the entire amount, which I never even received because of taxes. When I refund less the tax, the refund amount is less than she paid? I keep guessing how much to refund to see if it matches what she paid. She paid $3050 plus $251.63 in taxes. If I try and refund her just what I net, it comes out wonky still.,

Why is this so hard? I have a call into paypal but of course the wait time is forever.
 
#9
littlerock said:
I know.. it's probably been covered but my search is not bringing it up. If I'm re-selling an item that i already paid tax on, and I am losing money, why is that item being taxed again? Even if the buyer is paying, that digs into what I can recoup. What is the logic in this?

Please help me understand. Can I show an original receipt (aka money lost) and tax ALREADY paid for this item?
Click to expand...
If you're reselling the item, the BUYER is paying the sales tax based on the amount of the purchase. It doesn't come out of your proceeds at all. It's charged separately as a separate line item.
 
#10
BeenBurned said:
If you're reselling the item, the BUYER is paying the sales tax based on the amount of the purchase. It doesn't come out of your proceeds at all. It's charged separately as a separate line item.
Click to expand...
For example, this is the details from a recent purchase. I paid the top amount to the seller. The tax was added and collected by ebay for remittance to my state. But it doesn't take away from the seller except to the extent that the seller will pay the PP fee (2.9% plus $.30) on the amount of tax collected even though the seller never sees nor has possession of that money.

In other words, the seller isn't the one paying the tax on the sale. The buyer pays it on the purchase.

Make sense?

Screen Shot 2020-07-30 at 12.56.02 PM.png
 
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#11
littlerock said:
Thanks you guys. So my sale was an LV and the taxes were nearly 300 making it more expensive for my buyer. She wants to cancel sale. I canceled sale in ebay but when I go to paypal it's really confusing. It offers me to refund the entire amount, which I never even received because of taxes. When I refund less the tax, the refund amount is less than she paid? I keep guessing how much to refund to see if it matches what she paid. She paid $3050 plus $251.63 in taxes. If I try and refund her just what I net, it comes out wonky still.,

Why is this so hard? I have a call into paypal but of course the wait time is forever.
Click to expand...
REfund the full amount. The sales tax will show as being refunded by ebay. (As shown in my post above, I refunded the amount of the item. The sales tax portion of the refund came from ebay to the buyer.) (For the record, I don't know what it looks like to the buyer when the refund is issued.)
 
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#12
Right, I get the seller pays it. Just seems wholly unfair (for lack of a better word) to tax one item multiple times, just because it changes hands. We all our taxed up the ying-yang, except for the richest of the rich.. but I digress. That is another topic. lol
 
#13
So if I'm following this right, I will be short in my ebay account. I will have to cough up the amount of the paypal fee in order to refund the buyer correctly. What a crap show. Thanks guys! I'm going to go bury my head back in the sand after this one.
 
#15
Hi!
Question - I read eBay sends a 1099 and you have to report the sales on your tax report.
So does that mean you end up paying income tax on your sales on eBay? Even if you are selling used items and are technically losing money?
Thanks!
 
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