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" i will be getting an officail business licence"
You do not need any license to sell on eBay (or anywhere else online for that matter) - unless or until your annual worldwide revenue exceed Cdn$ 30,000
" first is concerning the HST do i charge this to all my international buyers, considering i live in ontario"
First thing first - are you registered with GST/HST? If you are (I frankly do not see a need for that at this time) the government would have given you all the information at time of registration. You remit GST/HST on taxable transactions made within Canada at the rate (GST or HST) applicable to the province of the buyer. For example, you are based in Ontario and ship a taxable item to a buyer in NS, you need to remit 15% HST. a buyer in AB you remit 5% GST, a buyer in ON, you remit 13% HST, etc... ("transaction" means the total amount of money received : item plus shipping and handling)
No HST is chargeable for items shipped outside Canada.
If you are not registered with GST/HST, you cannot charge or remit taxes. It is illegal to do so.
"...when i look at a listing i see an import charge .."..."ive also been reading up on the global shipping program, ..."
This optional program (GSP) only applies to American and British sellers shipping to Canadian and international buyers. It does not apply to Canadian sellers shipping from within Canada.
"i plan on buying a barcode scanner to keep track of inventory. "
Why? What kind of business are you planning? How many items do you plan to carry? 100? 1,000? 10,000? Singles or large quantities of each? New or used? What category? Low priced or mid priced or high priced?
The best thing you can do is to keep it simple. Start small, learn the business (mail order through online sales is not an easy business) and grow with time.
Good Luck.
"in order to get goods from distributors"
Do you have a wholesaler in mind already? What kind of products are you looking at?
"also how do i figure import charges for internnational buyers"
As stated above : you do not.
I frankly do not think you should get a GST/HST registration until you have some selling experience. While there are some advantages in being registered (ITCs), it also comes with responsibilities.
Have you checked what your eventual eBay competitors do? Do they charge GST/HST or are they small sellers who do not charge the tax? Or absorb it in their price? What do you think eBay buyers prefer? Buying from sellers charging tax or those who do not?
" i will be mostly be selling electronic/computer parts."
Very competitive category!
Have you checked your costs (including incoming shipping charges) and compared to the selling price (including shipping) offered by eBay competitors?
How will your selling prices (including shipping) compare to your competitors?
When I mention competitors prices, I do not mean "listing" prices, I mean "sold" prices. Quite often we will see 100 similar products offered on eBay at prices from $30 to $45 (for example) but when checking "sold" items, the average sale is closer to $10 or $20 only.
What have you planned as far as your shipping costs and charges are concerned? How will you compete with American sellers who generally have lower shipping costs (and most sell with "free shipping") or Chinese sellers who pay almost no shipping to send to North America.
Does that leave enough profit to cover your cost of goods? eBay and PayPal fees? allowance for losses? a return on your invested capital? and your time?
"ive done all that research already"
If you do not mind me being candid, your questions suggest the research you have done may lead you to the wrong conclusions.
You seem to misunderstand what your American competitors are charging. To test it, log on to eBay.com and use an American shipping address (zip 90210 for example). That will tell you what your competition is doing.
Nothing to do with "import charges" etc... Just look at the American marketplace.
If you feel your costs will allow you to make a profit (after all expenses) by all means go for it.
"ebay does have some specific requirements and rules that many new sellers do not take into account."
With mail order, there is a higher risk of losses within the postal systems. Some categories may experience higher degree risks of abuse and/or fraud. Each seller must determine their own risk tolerance. It affects pricing and shipping. For example, sellers with a low risk tolerance factor may decide to ship with tracking (to "protect themselves") raising the overall selling price of their products when compared with sellers with more mail order experience and higher risk tolerance shipping by the cheapest method available.
When buyers send payment through PayPal a new seller (shipping from Canada) will find that payments are held for 21 days although the seller is still responsible for immediate shipment once payment has been made by the buyer. For more information:
on eBay.com: http://pages.ebay.com/help/pay/questions/pending.html
on eBay.ca: http://pages.ebay.ca/help/pay/questions/pending.html
You will notice the rules are slightly different.
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