eBay

velvet@ebay · ‎05-03-2022

Hi everyone –

We know you might have questions regarding the email you recently received about eBay Canada collecting Canada Sales Tax (GST/HST/QST/ PST) on behalf of our sellers. Please feel free to leave your questions and comments here and we’ll get them answered as soon as possible. Keep in mind there could be a delay as we check with internal teams to ensure we’re getting you the right answers to your questions.

Thanks for your patience!

gaming-canada · ‎06-11-2022

jasmen@ebay

Can you please advise how is this possible when we are registered for quick method GST/HST accounting with CRA for all products we sell? eBay can't remit this with quick method

g1v2d3 · ‎06-12-2022

What if I decide not to give you my Business Number and decide I wish to continue imputing my tax to the CRA myself, as I do now? If you don`t get my Tax number then you can`t collect tax for/from me because you won`t know on whose behalf you are collecting for?

One of the reasons I decline your remittance is because the form has QST checked-off on it and I live in Ontario so I don`t pay QST.

Another reason is that the email address for which you want us to send our Business Tax number is not secured. I find that careless and disrespecting my Business because you have not taken into account proper security for this valuable information.

g1v2d3

marnotom! · ‎06-12-2022

@g1v2d3 wrote:

What if I decide not to give you my Business Number and decide I wish to continue imputing my tax to the CRA myself, as I do now? If you don`t get my Tax number then you can`t collect tax for/from me because you won`t know on whose behalf you are collecting for?
One of the reasons I decline your remittance is because the form has QST checked-off on it and I live in Ontario so I don`t pay QST.

The form authorizes eBay to collect and remit GST/HST and QST on your sales, not your eBay fees. The form and the information on it is issued by and submitted to Revenue Canada and Revenue Quebec, not eBay. The reason why QST is checked off on it is because under the new system your sales will be subject to QST if the buyer is located in Quebec, and will also be subject to PST where provincial sales taxes are charged separately from GST.

If you don't give eBay permission to collect and remit these taxes on your behalf, either you and eBay will both end up levying tax charges on your sales which will lead to very angry buyers, or else you'll be blocked from selling to prevent this from happening. All Canadian sellers will be subject to having taxes added to their domestic sales, not just registered ones.

@g1v2d3 wrote:

Another reason is that the email address for which you want us to send our Business Tax number is not secured. I find that careless and disrespecting my Business because you have not taken into account proper security for this valuable information.

Your tax number should be on any receipts that you issue to your buyers. I don't see how providing it in an email attachment is any different or any less secure.

g1v2d3 · ‎06-14-2022

How will you be sending us confirmation that you have received the Tax documents.

ty

g1v2d3

ricarmic · ‎06-14-2022

velvet@ebay

This is a great question! I sent my form in on June 2nd with an acknowledgement request because I wasn't automagically sent the form email.

I haven't heard anything back....

I'm presuming at some point we'll get an email message back with the fully signed off form?

velvet@ebay · ‎06-15-2022

Hi everyone! We've gone through and pulled questions from the past few weeks to forward on to the tax team. When they get us replies, we'll follow-up with them here as we have been. Thank you for the questions and for your patience. 😊

phc64 · ‎06-17-2022

As an Ontario based buyer, you will be paying HST regardless of the location of the seller. It does not matter whether the seller is in Ontario, elsewhere in Canada, the United States, Zimbabwe, or on the moon.

Similarly, buyers in provinces that still have a PST separate from the GST will be paying both GST and PST regardless of the location of the seller.

phc64 · ‎06-17-2022

I also requested that eBay acknowledge receipt of the form when I sent it a couple of weeks ago, but have yet to receive any such acknowledgment.

pjcdn2005 · ‎06-17-2022

@phc64 wrote:
As an Ontario based buyer, you will be paying HST regardless of the location of the seller. It does not matter whether the seller is in Ontario, elsewhere in Canada, the United States, Zimbabwe, or on the moon.

Similarly, buyers in provinces that still have a PST separate from the GST will be paying both GST and PST regardless of the location of the seller.

Although I might have misunderstood, it's my understanding that Canadian buyers will be charged gst/hst/pst only if the seller is in Canada. Perhaps someone else knows if that is the case?

ricarmic · ‎06-17-2022

My understanding is also that it is inter-Canadian (or "intra"?? Canada to Canada anyway) purchases, so purchasing from a US seller avoids the taxes if it does NOT get charged coming across the border.

This will put me now at a disadvantage against US sellers as my fellow ON collectors can save 13% by purchasing from the US if it comes across the border taxless. (this is also part of the reason I've traditionally ate the taxes).

The good news for me is that a lot of US sellers won't sell to Canada or use GSP so that will defer some back to me.

Time will tell!

marnotom! · ‎06-17-2022

@pjcdn2005 wrote:
Although I might have misunderstood, it's my understanding that Canadian buyers will be charged gst/hst/pst only if the seller is in Canada. Perhaps someone else knows if that is the case?

Yes, only sales from Canadian sellers will be charged GST/HST/PST as line items at the time of the sale. The current mechanisms for charging/collecting taxes on casual imports will remain in place.

pjcdn2005 · ‎06-17-2022

Thank you ricarmic and marnatom for confirming that.

phc64 · ‎06-17-2022

Thanks to all for the corrections. I apologize for the incorrect information. It just goes to show how confusing this all is.

tch_ca · ‎06-18-2022

I have requested this twice without a response. The **bleep**py service from ebay supprt continues.

marnotom! · ‎06-18-2022

@tch_ca, you should check out this thread as I think what you want will be linked there:

https://community.ebay.ca/t5/Seller-Central/eBay-will-start-collecting-taxes-on-our-behalf-effective...

boxbrnd · ‎06-20-2022

Myself and others I know have not been sent a form to fill out which elects ebay to be the billing agent on our behalf for the CRA. Will we receive any word from ebay regarding this? How can we follow up with ebay and receive this form?

marnotom! · ‎06-20-2022

@boxbrnd wrote:

Myself and others I know have not been sent a form to fill out which elects ebay to be the billing agent on our behalf for the CRA. Will we receive any word from ebay regarding this? How can we follow up with ebay and receive this form?

Do you need to fill out that form, i.e. are you currently registered to charge your eBay buyers GST/HST? If not, don't worry about it. If you do need the form, there's a link a thread that has a link to the form in my previous post (message 175).

ricarmic · ‎06-20-2022

velvet@ebay

I was finally able to catch up to the CRA folks today, and it has caused a question that I need you to pass along to the Tax team please!

Regarding this "obligation" in the Billing Agent Authorization form that ebay and the sellers are solidarily liable for:

"reporting and remitting the net tax, as well as any amount that the agent might neglect to remit and that is reasonably attributable to a supply covered by the election" (where agent=eBay and election is the Billing Agent Authorization).

The question I have is what are we as sellers supposed to do if we notice a transaction has not had GST/HST collected when it should have been.

Sellers are jointly liable for it being collected. Sellers of course can't after July 1st collect it or request it as it is supposed to be automagically collected, and nobody wants us asking customers after the fact to remit taxes. So if it is missed for a given transaction, I do not understand how the process works to fix these or if there is a general understanding between the CRA and ebay that there is a certain % of stuff that is ok to be missed.

Really what I want to know is what are we accountable for to ensure that if we are individually audited by the CRA that we aren't dinged for any "missed" transactions.

The reason I am worried about this is I somewhat regularly see European transactions of mine being "missed" VAT wise even in situations where the same buyer bought more than one thing in separate transactions at the "same" time.

Anyway I'm hoping the answer to this is simple, I'm just confused at this point about whether it is covered in some master agreement, or how it will work.

THX very much for your help with this!

flipistics · ‎06-20-2022

I was told very specifically in one of the weekly sessions questions I asked that eBay would take over full responsibility and any errors would be resolved by them. I certainly would like to see an updated seller agreement that specifically states that though. Here was the question and answer:

5. I believe the tax forms indicated that eBay and the seller are JOINTLY responsible for the correct tax collection and any mistakes that are made. Is anything in the policies being changed to ensure that if eBay makes a mistake on their end, it won't all be shovelled at the seller?

eBay is responsible for the application and collection of the tax. Any errors related to the collection of the tax will be eBay’s responsibility to remedy – and refund to the purchaser or remit to the appropriate taxing authorities, as applicable. Beginning July 1, 2022 eBay is responsible for the collection and remittance of the tax and sellers should not have any responsibility for any errors in the application and/or collection of the tax. The taxing authorities will recognize eBay as the responsible party.