Canada post strike is killing sales for us!
Summary: sin-n-dex shares frustrations about the financial impact of a Canada Post strike on their business, noting that they owe a small amount of HST for sales before the strike. They mention the complexities of remitting HST due to living in Canada and shipping from the US, which leads to complications with tax declarations. chicweb and ricarmic discuss how eBay handles tax collection and the confusion around cross-border sales. chicweb and sin-n-dex explore the challenges of tax paperwork, while recped and sin-n-dex debate how eBay's tax tables and shipping origins affect tax collection. The conversation reveals the administrative burden and confusion sellers face due to differing tax regulations and shipping practices.
I sell mostly to the US, but some sales are to Canada.
It's the 30th of November and I'm doing my HST Return (my orders ship from New York, so HST is not added for Canadian buyers, however because I live in Canada and have my business here I still have to file and remit HST as a percentage of what was sold to Canadian buyers with records to back it up).
I owe the Canadian government a grand total of $3.60 for HST this month (for the four sales that happened before the strike, or slipped through because my updating Canada as an excluded country didn't take to all listings the first time around).
I've been looking at previous months... in 2024, the least I owed in HST was $109 CAD. The most was $271 CAD. When you consider the amount remitted is 5-15% of the total sales and do that math, that's a lot of sales I'm missing out on!!
I'm not alone I know, but I wanted to vent because it's time for them to get themselves back to work and stop making Canadians suffer. They totally did the strike for Christmas on purpose, and I knew they were going to strike before it even was public news (through a contact that works there). So I'm not caught off guard by the strike, but all those bulletins they were putting out to inform the public was all to make it look like there was nothing to worry about. I still remember when they went through the timeline and said no strike before November 3. Yay, just in time for everyone to do Christmas shopping.
Some people who shopped early this year have their items in limbo with Canada Post and are wondering if the gifts will even arrive in time for Christmas.
I would use Stallion Express for Canadian shipping, but I send a lot of lightweight cheap items and thinks that go as letters, so it doesn't make sense to be charging $10 in shipping to ship a $3 item. Better just to block Canada until this blows over.
/end rant.
C.
chicweb
·1 year agoIf I understand correctly:
- Shipped from Canada to everywhere = eBay collects (I remember selling to the UK and it was taxed also)
- Shipped from the States to Canada = eBay does not collect?
If that's the case, that explains why OP has to declare and remit. Because the Feds collects GST on Digital Items cross border from the US... ?
Wow... what a mess.
sin-n-dex
OP1 year agoIt's a paperwork nightmare for me, I wish they'd just collect taxes on Canadian orders and then I wouldn't have to remit anything (and paperwork would be simpler, I still have to file, I make over 30K annually on all my businesses which are all registered under the same tax ID).
If I don't remit it and it catches up with me later, I'll have a lot of tax owing. I remit $1500-2000 per annum in GST/HST taxes to the Canadian government on online sales alone.
C.
chicweb
·1 year agoOh I understand entirely.
Imagine, It was a bit of a nightmare with my accountant. Being incorporated and all, paperwork needs to be perfect. Your position is even more complicated.
In those difficult time, it adds to the stress.
I'm sure everything will get better soon (let's all hope).
sin-n-dex
OP1 year agoI'm a bookkeeper by trade, so I do all my own tax paper work and tax returns, etc. I have access to a CPA to ask questions when I come up with something I don't understand. The CPA went through all the HST laws with me when I hit the 30K threshold to help me find the best way to file each month. (Technically I can file once a year, but there are benefits to doing it monthly, starting with the fact paperwork isn't piling up all year).
C.
chicweb
·1 year agoYes. I preferred quaterly, in my case. Thinking about switching monthly, tho. Annually is out of the question, that's for sure.
In my case, the CPA is not optional with the financial statements, documentations and all that jazz.
One positive? Less bookeeping to be done for november and december... I would have preferred otherwise. lol 😉
chicweb
·1 year agoI agree with you for the strike.
About HST. Isn't eBay collecting that for sellers? Aren't they the one that declares and remit it to the government?
ricarmic
·1 year agoOP mentioned that they're shipping from NY so the bots think seller is in USA so won't be adding Canadian taxes to Canadians as the bots think its someone from the USA selling to Canada (so the taxes theoretically would be caught when it comes across the border).
Its interesting that the bots don't use country of registration, instead of country of shipping, but it looks like they don't. I guess there'd be problems either way.
chicweb
·1 year agoMmm yes. If its the case... Special scenario here.
Isnt the taxes charged by the customer's address?
When I sell items in the USA, it charges them their local taxes. eBay should take care of everything taxes related.
ricarmic
·1 year ago@chicweb yes that's true for sales into the US from "anywhere", but my belief (which could be wrong) is that the Canadian taxes are only applied when it is a sale from a Canadian to another Canadian because theoretically Canadians get taxed when it comes over the border into Canada still. Again I might be wrong.
That's also why I wonder why it doesn't go by country of registration instead of shipping, although I guess there's a lot of people who've moved countrys, I'm regularly getting folks who have one country of registration and are living (not using forwarding service) in a different country as their job moves them around the world.
sin-n-dex
OP1 year agoIf eBay puts taxes to Canadian buyers (because I live in Canada), and then the items come across the border, they'll be taxed again. In Canada all imports are subject to tax. They haven't upgraded their system to allow eBay to collect international taxes and start letting imports come in tax-free if the tax number is on the package (like they do in Australia and GB).
So if eBay were to charge taxes, then it would be double tax if the buyer gets charged again. At some point Canada wanted to change the rules so all eBay purchases were taxed and nothing would get taxes on import, but they haven't done this yet.
C.
sin-n-dex
OP1 year agoOn my sales, taxes are charged to all USA buyers in every state. Not sure if they do this if you're shipping from Canada or not... My shipping location and return address are in New York.
Some countries collect taxes on all eBay orders (and I write their tax number on the package, for Australia, GB, New Zealand, Singapore, Malaysia... all places that have GST added to eBay purchases). In Canada nothing is being collected, and since my business is registered in Ontario, I have to collect it (but can't legally, so it's calculated as a percentage of the gross sale).
C.
recped
·1 year agoI don't know about "interesting", it's the way it must be unless the Feds decide to force them to collect GST/HST/PST on all purchases being shipped to Canada.
This was a failure on the part of the Feds, they only applied the cross border collection of GST to Digital items.
sin-n-dex
OP1 year agoIt's expected that HST is charged at the border. I write "HST collected in Ontario" with my HST number since I'm remitting it. My buyers don't have to pay on imports. I have at least $1000 monthly in Cdn sales and file HST returns monthly in case anyone is checking.
Definitely do not want to defraud the tax man.
C.
sin-n-dex
OP1 year agoIt does if you're registered in Canada. I'm a USA seller who lives in Canada, so I can't add HST, eBay won't collect it for me, but by nature of my location I have to file an HST return and remit it anyway.
C.
recped
·1 year agoHave you tried setting up the tax tables? I've never been sure if they still had any effect but I know that when I listed on .com any order shipping to Canada would have the appropriate GST/HST added. (I have been collecting GST/HST on eBay sales for 25 years).
Clearly eBay ignores the Sales Tax Table for .ca listings but maybe it still operates on other eBay sites. If not I'm not sure why it's still there given the only options are the 13 Provinces & Territories.
Of course the tax-included pricing that you do is a fully legal option. I'm just opposed to any type of hidden taxation such as we had prior to GST.
sin-n-dex
OP1 year agoI'm registered and list on the .com site, so my tax table is for the US states. It doesn't give me the option to set up tax tables for Canada.
Plus since I ship from New York, I don't think it's legal to be charging taxes on orders. Remitting them as a percentage of total sale (so it equals the tax amount for that province) seems to be the best way to comply with CRA and not get into any legal trouble.
C.
recped
·1 year agoGo to your site preferences on ebay.ca for the Canadian Tax Table
Of course it's legal, It doesn't matter where you ship from (and it's not New York regardless of what you put in your listings), you are a Canadian seller with a Canadian Managed Payments account and you ship Canadian orders from Canada.
In any event, have a look at the .ca tax table and let me know if it's active or not.
sin-n-dex
OP1 year agoNo it's not active. It won't let me toggle to add taxes for Canadian provinces.
I'm actually registered on .com, not .ca. I registered in 1998 and there was no .ca. I'm grandfathered to keep my account on .com.
According to eBay Customer Service if the shipping origin is in New York (which it is for USPS), then it's considered to be shipping from New York, not Canada. I see your point because I use Stallion which means I drop packages off for shipping in Canada. But if the tracking doesn't match the item location in the listing then it can be considered a violation if someone complains. I post the USPS tracking (and used to buy my postage directly from eBay since I'm set up to purchase USPS postage), my return address in my profile is in New York. So eBay says I'm technically shipping from New York. Not sure if CRA would agree on that detail or not, but if I file and remit, I don't see a problem in dealing with CRA.
C.