Canadian PST

[snowbankcreek]

I have to collect only PST for my province. I also have to report and remit quarterly. Is eBay going to file on my behalf and do the paperwork and bookkeeping or send me the PST that I charge on my invoices ? I don’t have to collect gst so if they collect it will I have to pay it back to my buyers? What a gong show!

[marnotom!]

You let eBay do the work. They charge, collect, remit; you pay FVF on those tax charges, just as you would for a sale to most of the US, the EU, UK, Australia, etc. I’m not sure why you feel you would have to give GST refunds. Seems pretty straightforward to me.

[snowbankcreek]

I have to remit quarterly for the PST through my online tax account and fill in all the paperwork. I'm not giving anyone my personal sign in information to the Ministry of Finance or the Receiver General to do this, if they mess it up I am held responsible.  I am not required to collect GST so how do they decide to figure that out? If they collect it on my behalf I will be required to reimburse it to my buyers. 

[marnotom!]

eBay will be collecting GST (and HST) because the feds want them to do it.  It applies to all sales, whether the seller has a registration number or not.  While you'll pay final value fees on the tax as it's part of the total transaction value, the tax itself won't be part of your income so there's nothing for you to reimburse.

I'm no accountant, so I would check with yours or somebody from the Ministry of Finance/Receiver General, but I think that because of this arrangement, you don't have any need to collect PST from your BC buyers yourself unless it's clear that eBay won't be doing this in addition to collecting GST and HST.

[reallynicestamps]

What category of goods and services is exempt from the GST?

[pjcdn2005]

I was wondering that as well.  I don't think that I've ever heard about someone collecting provincial tax but not the gst.

[snowbankcreek]

I dont have a GST number because my sales are under $30k a year. The only tax I am retistered and obligated to collect is PST for British Columbia which I have to remit to the government quarterly. If the total collected is under $21 ( I think) then it's kept as a commision and counted as income.  So if ebay is collecting GST on my behalf will they refund it to the buyers or remit my PST on my behalf. that's where it's very confusing and there seems to be no one in cs that has the answer to that. 

[reallynicestamps]

If eBay is collecting GST for you, it is also collecting it for me and for @pjcdn2005  and @marnotom!  etc.

Which is going to be over $30,000. More like $300,000,000. 😎

So our Canadian customers will all be paying GST, and various amounts to the provinces. All of which will be handled by eBay.

You will only be responsible for your offline sales (shop, flea market), or online sales from your own website if you have one.

If you only sell online, you will be doing much less work, because the various venues (eBay, Ruby Lane, AZ, whatever) will be charging and collecting tax.

And Managed Payments will be charging fees to you on your entire payment, which will now include all the taxes that eBay collected.

Basically what is happening with a sale to a US customer now.

[reallynicestamps]

BTW - do you realize that you are in BC but offering Free Local Pickup to US customers?

[marnotom!]

@snowbankcreek, I think you may have originally posted your question before @lotzofuniquegoodies posted a screenshot of the email eBay sent out to most active sellers on this subject.  Reading it again, it does appear that eBay plans to collect PST as well as HST and GST.

https://community.ebay.ca/t5/Seller-Central/eBay-Canada-collecting-Canadian-Sales-Tax-as-of-July-1-2...

To rework @reallynicestamps' post a little, if eBay plans on collect PST for applicable sales from every seller, then they're going to be collect it from you as well, so as far as I can see there's no need for you to continue collecting it once they start doing so.  But I'm not an accountant or Receiver General employee.

Have you received the authorization form from eBay mentioned in that email?  It sounds as though it went out today.

[snowbankcreek]

BTW I do realize that local pick up is free for local buyers. Never in 14 years on eBay had someone from the US want to come here to pick up an item...

[snowbankcreek]

I did receive the email. Interestingly there is no spot to enter my PST number. Just QST. It won't accept my BC PST number. I called regarding the BC PST and they say yes that eBay will collect the PST and GST (even if we are not required to have a GST number because our sales are below $30K) for all of us small sellers and collect the commission that we would receive for filing our business taxes. They've got a win /win for them. 

[marnotom!]

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@snowbankcreek wrote:

I did receive the email. Interestingly there is no spot to enter my PST number. Just QST. It won't accept my BC PST number. I called regarding the BC PST and they say yes that eBay will collect the PST and GST (even if we are not required to have a GST number because our sales are below $30K) for all of us small sellers and collect the commission that we would receive for filing our business taxes. They've got a win /win for them. 

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The form just has the Revenue Canada and Revenue Quebec logos at the top.  Quebec is a "special case" when it comes to the collection of provincial sales taxes, just as it's a "special case" compared to other provinces when it comes to many other things.  Since there are couple other provinces that collect PST besides BC and Quebec, although I don't know if they have lower sales thresholds for tax registration the way BC does that would lead to a seller being registered to only collect PST.

Your business number is probably all the information that the feds and BC require, but if you want to add your PST number to the form, I would probably shoehorn it into section 3.2, but I'm not a business tax expert. You might want to consult again on that if you're feeling unsure.

[2006balla]

Where does one get this authorization form? How does ebay determine who to send this form to?

I'm GST and PST registered in BC for many years and file GST once a year and PST every quarter. Since eBay started collecting GST PST in July 1, now when I file PST for months of July - September, do i file it $0 or file the correct amount but don't send payment? I had a quick glance at the July-Sept quarter form on https://www.etax.gov.bc.ca/btp/eservices/_/ and the form has not changed looks same as years before.

Sounds like a mess to me.