eBay collecting Canadian Sales Tax as of July 1, 2022

[OfficialTechSpace]

Myself, along with many other Canadian eBay sellers have received a notice via email today.

This notice explains that eBay will begin to collect sales taxes from Canadian buyers on behalf of sellers, starting July 1st 2022. Stating, quote:

Quote

Dear eBay Canada Seller,

Pursuant to the guidelines announced in Canada’s 2021 Federal Budget and recent provincial sales tax amendments, eBay Canada Limited (“eBay”) will be required to collect Canadian sales taxes (GST/HST/QST/PST) on applicable sales to Canada-based buyers.

Effective July 1, 2022, for all sales of tangible goods sold within Canada, eBay will be collecting the Canadian sales taxes (GST/HST/QST/ PST) from Canada-based buyers on behalf of Canada-based sellers (irrespective of registration status) and remitting the tax to the appropriate tax authorities.

For sellers not registered to collect tax with the CRA and provinces, there is no action necessary. You will begin to see sales taxes charged and collected by eBay on buyer purchases beginning in July. eBay collected taxes will also be displayed in your seller reporting as of that date.

For GST/HST and/or QST registered sellers, eBay will be appointed as a billing agent for collection and remittance of Canadian sales taxes where the sales tax laws do not automatically require it. As such, eBay will require completion of billing agent authorization forms. A separate communication for GST/HST and QST-registered sellers will be forthcoming.

With this change in sales tax collection responsibilities, eBay aims to alleviate our sellers of the administrative burden to accurately charge and collect sales taxes on taxable sales made through the platform. eBay is taking over this responsibility for all sellers – not just those that are not registered – in an effort to simplify the experience for our community. Any questions or concerns about tax collection will be handled by eBay Customer Service.

eBay will also be responsible for collection of the Canadian sales taxes on supplies to Canada-based buyers of digitally downloaded goods, including sales from non-Canadian sellers.

 

Honestly, I'm new to eBay so I'm surprised this wasn't already implemented long ago. Some form of tax collection seems reasonable for any online retailer/marketplace, I suppose originally excluding used goods. I can see how eBay would differ from another platform like craigslist, where deals are largely made hand-to-hand rather than over the web and digitally. To my knowledge, some states/provinces have already had some form of this in the past on eBay. I assume the big change is that it's now got a grip on Canada as a whole, site-wide. Seems like a good idea anyways, eBay's now paying its way into our economy, right?   Can't say that sounds like a bad thing.

 

How does everyone else feel about this?

 

Source:

eBay Canada collecting Canadian Sales Tax as of July 1, 2022.eml

 

[Demonking]

I was upset when they stop allowing for payouts through paypal, like everyone has a bank account.

[Brooksie359]

14 minutes ago, Demonking said:

I was upset when they stop allowing for payouts through paypal, like everyone has a bank account.

Honestly unless you are a kid it's hard to get by without one so alot companies just assume everyone has one. Granted I have had an account even when I was a kid so I am surprised when people say they don't have one. 

[Zodiark1593]

1 hour ago, Brooksie359 said:

Honestly unless you are a kid it's hard to get by without one so alot companies just assume everyone has one. Granted I have had an account even when I was a kid so I am surprised when people say they don't have one. 

I was able to skate by without until about a couple years ago when I needed money transferred in exchange for some product photography of a flashlight. The only thing I use it for now is for Floatplane. 

[leadeater]

I assumed this was already being done. Amazon is already doing it right?

[OfficialTechSpace]

41 minutes ago, leadeater said:

I assumed this was already being done. Amazon is already doing it right?

Yep, amazon does it. So do most retailers. eBay too, but only in the states/provinces that required that to be done. Now Canada recently adjusted the provincial sales tax amendment so that it's always required, to my understanding at least. But hey, I'm no lawyer. I have no clue.

[leadeater]

45 minutes ago, OfficialTechSpace said:

Yep, amazon does it. So do most retailers. eBay too, but only in the states/provinces that required that to be done. Now Canada recently adjusted the provincial sales tax amendment so that it's always required, to my understanding at least. But hey, I'm no lawyer. I have no clue.

Ah that makes a lot more sense. It's been a thing here for ages too, I just figured a place like Canada was a little more unified in it's sale taxes and this was already a thing, quite the surprise to hear it's not and I thought it was Canada entirely.

[RejZoR]

2 hours ago, leadeater said:

I assumed this was already being done. Amazon is already doing it right?

So is AliExpress for entire Europe. They charge VAT on every sale since end of 2020. In general I don't mind it. Cheap items don't have a huge increase in price because they are cheap in the first place and I avoid fiddling with stupid customs because it's all already paid for. Dealing with customs is such a stupid slow process. They need ages to process stuff, then they notify you, then you need to provide proof of purchase on which they charge the VAT and slap extra processing fee and in the end I had to pay VAT in cash to the delivery guy. Now I just pay the thing and it arrives to my home. It still takes some time for customs to process stuff, but at least I don't have to deal with any of it. More convenient for me and the pigster gets its share on every purchase. Everyone happy. I guess.

[leadeater]

3 hours ago, RejZoR said:

Dealing with customs is such a stupid slow process. They need ages to process stuff, then they notify you, then you need to provide proof of purchase on which they charge the VAT and slap extra processing fee and in the end I had to pay VAT in cash to the delivery guy. Now I just pay the thing and it arrives to my home. It still takes some time for customs to process stuff, but at least I don't have to deal with any of it. More convenient for me and the pigster gets its share on every purchase. Everyone happy. I guess.

Yea I remember ages ago having to deal with that crap, it also got worse at one point because I had to register a personal "GST Account" or w/e some gov thing where I have a GST ID number but it's a personal type not business just so I could pay the GST on items I was buying from overseas.

 

At least for me it was just a matter of the courier company ringing me once it's in country and providing a CC to charge it to or GST ID and CC once that was a thing. So glad that's no longer required, couldn't even tell you nor find out what my GST number is anymore.

[Senzelian]

This is rather interesting to me, because in Germany this is already being done since the existance of eBay, but has nothing to do with eBay itself.

If you own a retail business in Germany, you'll have to take care of taxes yourself. Whether you sell through eBay or not doesn't matter. So if I buy a product from a business through eBay, the business has to provide a detailed bill to me, on which I can see the amount of taxes I paid. The business then needs to report that amount to the tax office. If they're not the manufacturer of the product and bought it from a whole seller, then they'll get the amount they paid in taxes back, because they already paid taxes to the whole seller.

 

Private sales are not taxable in Germany.

So did I understand this correctly that in Canada you have to pay taxes, even for a private transaction? I hope that's not the case, but if it is, that is really f*cked up.

[leadeater]

14 hours ago, Senzelian said:

So did I understand this correctly that in Canada you have to pay taxes, even for a private transaction?

Yes, I think. But the seller doesn't have to do anything.

 

Quote

For sellers not registered to collect tax with the CRA and provinces, there is no action necessary. You will begin to see sales taxes charged and collected by eBay on buyer purchases beginning in July. eBay collected taxes will also be displayed in your seller reporting as of that date.

 

[Sauron]

that's how it's always been in my country, I didn't know it was different elsewhere.

 

[trag1c]

On 5/5/2022 at 5:15 PM, Senzelian said:

So did I understand this correctly that in Canada you have to pay taxes, even for a private transaction? I hope that's not the case, but if it is, that is really f*cked up.

So private transactions are supposed to be tax free most of the time. So I am not sure how this is supposed to work exactly because it's only businesses that are supposed to collect GST and provincial taxes and only if they have more than 30k of sales in a year (or quarter can't remember). So if you're not a business selling on Ebay then there should be no obligation to pay taxes but that doesn't seem to be the case on Ebay now.