Peter wrote:
The seller is supposed to charge VAT but not all do
It still don’t understand how the UK can enforce that. They have no jurisdiction over sellers abroad.
The news here is full of people who fairly obviously saw a bargain (a price not including VAT but they didn’t spot it) and got burnt for both the VAT and the shipper charge. The media is ultra sympathetic to them; they can’t say people need to be smarter and less impulsive. But some shippers charge a lot for the admin, even though they offer great bulk deals to the supplier.
In fairness, some web shops try very hard to hide the fact that the goods will be shipped from abroad. E.g. they provide an address and a phone number within (in my case) the EU or even Sweden. When you get the delivery notification it turns out that the stuff has actually been shipped from China!
Yes, you should be suspicious if there is no information about a VAT amount when you pay, but that’s easy to miss if you’re not consciously looking for it.
It still don’t understand how the UK can enforce that. They have no jurisdiction over sellers abroad.
It looks like it was within the deal done i.e. Brussels agreed to it on behalf of its EU based traders.
Of course the UK cannot enforce it directly, but let’s say a high profile EU mail order retailer (I can’t think of any names off hand, perhaps because I have almost never seen any bargains on the mainland*) was seen shipping 100k packages a year to the UK, that would be readily visible, and HMRC (the UK tax people) would then look into whether that retailer had registered with HMRC for the VAT scheme and if so how much they are paying in. There must be some cross border audit provision, allowing somebody somewhere (prob99 the seller’s domestic tax authority) to visit them and do an audit if they either have not registered with HMRC, or have registered and been paying HMRC £10/year 
It’s certainly a novel concept, which surprised me, but it seems to have been done to stop EU sellers flogging a ton of stuff ex-VAT to the UK and the Post Office etc missing a lot of it due to sheer volume, so UK sellers would be at a disadvantage. It is claimed to be worth £350M/year “which will be spent on public services” hahaha. IMHO it is a mistake because you can already buy stuff directly from China (Ebay, Alibaba, etc etc) or the US, and with the exception of specific high-end brands (who take great care to not be available cheaply) everything in China is much cheaper. But the only example I can think of was a Kjus ski jacket, CHF 1700 at Zermatt, €350 in a German mail order shop.
In fairness, some web shops try very hard to hide the fact that the goods will be shipped from abroad. E.g. they provide an address and a phone number within (in my case) the EU or even Sweden. When you get the delivery notification it turns out that the stuff has actually been shipped from China!
Of course; this is the world’s second oldest profession now, because most Ebay buyers ritually avoid sellers who declare “China” because they know (a) it will take a month to arrive and (b) they might get hit for an import charge. The latter will however result in that seller getting kicked off Ebay…
I didn’t realise normal mail order places do this too…
Yes, you should be suspicious if there is no information about a VAT amount when you pay, but that’s easy to miss if you’re not consciously looking for it.
Indeed. And most fashion / gift buyers won’t be looking for that.
I will soon be ordering a load of TKS fluid from an EU source and will report on how that went. It will be way more than £135 so it should be “simple”. I will however check with them how exactly they plan to ship it.
* One kind person here obtained four Continental inner tubes for me, which didn’t exist in the UK, from a French bike shop whose site “crashed” when US was selected
Peter wrote:
It looks like it was within the deal done i.e. Brussels agreed to it on behalf of its EU based traders.
Where have you seen that? I’m curious as to how it would work. I’m not aware of any legislation to allow an the Irish state enforce UK tax law here. But likewise, it would seem strange that this hadn’t been considered.
Yeah; it is weird.
OTOH the UK has been operating the EC Sales List system for many years, on which you declare (declare only) your sales and purchases from EU countries. The numbers declared must of course match those on your VAT return otherwise you get an inspection 
The EU could have used a similar thing and just handed the money to the UK, but that would be extra work, and unwelcome politically on the mainland.
With regard to this point above it turns out that this applies to retailers in all countries, not just EU retailers.
It is a spectacular own goal for the UK govt, in their efforts to keep a lid on VAT evasion.
This rather rambling video (detail starts at 4:54) shows the problem from a US retailer’s POV
Not totally brexit related because it affects buying from the US also, but I’d make a couple of points:
Sellers can just ignore this. UK buyers are used to paying extra when buying from the US, and will expect the UK Post Office to either pass this through, or collect the VAT, with a £8+ admin charge.
If US sellers sell through one of the fronts (ebay.com etc) this is taken care of for them. I already see this “import charges prepaid” option on Ebay and it works fine.
Peter wrote:
I already see this “import charges prepaid” option on Ebay and it works fine.
Amazon has it, too. I really is a good idea as it saves the customers outrageous customs handling costs. But I can understand that smaller sellers don’t find it worthwhile.
While I totally agree with him, I suspect HMRC doesn’t really care.
If you would have bought something from him, and he no longer offers it, you’ll have to buy from someone else, either domestically, or an international seller who is prepared to take on the administration.
What I’d be more curious about is what happens to :
a) a seller who just ignores it and continues as before. (I suspect their customers get annoyed as they get charged the VAT by the post office + admin charge),
b) a seller who registered, charges VAT to the customer, but fails to remit it to the UK, and who has no presence nor assets in the UK.
I suspect, a) has upset customers and b) has their VAT number cancelled/flagged and quickly reverts to a) where the customers are being charged VAT on entry, even though they paid it to the seller, and become doubly upset.
Many of these small sellers will probably move to Amazon or Ebay who handle it for them.
a seller who just ignores it and continues as before. (I suspect their customers get annoyed as they get charged the VAT by the post office + admin charge),
If it is a US seller, nothing will happen to the seller, the customer gets the same “extras” bill from the shipper, which they have always had before
If it is an EU seller, nothing will happen to the seller, the customer gets an “extras” bill from the shipper, which will p1ss him off But, and it may well be I have lived an isolated life for all these years, but have rarely come across cases where buying from the mainland was worthwhile. As more countries joined the EU, prices have gone up and up everywhere, to pretty much the same level. So one imports only stuff which is somehow unique and impossible to get in the UK, or for some oddball reason just happens to be much cheaper. I bought a hugely discounted ski jacket ~4 years ago from a German shop, and some inner tubes last year from France but that shop could not ship to the UK (with some “story”) so a French friend here bought them for me and posted them. Most stuff from the mainland one can find on amazon or ebay. And if buying direct there have always been hassles, with the languages, often lousy customer service, and (as with the US) it being impractical or impossible to send anything back. Recently I bought a specialised battery from an amazon merchant in France, it was incorrectly described (incorrect for the stated appliance) and I just sent it back; no hassle at all. I wonder how many in the UK buy anything of significance direct from the mainland, in the mail order retail sector?
So I think this was a fear of “something” by HMRC which they “addressed” but in a stupid way which will be widely disregarded and anyway was never going to be big, and the US side of it (which probably is fairly big) will carry on as before.
a seller who registered, charges VAT to the customer, but fails to remit it to the UK, and who has no presence nor assets in the UK
He keeps the money – unless Brussels has done a deal with UK HMRC for audits. But of course the US IRS would never agree to such a thing.
I reckon that youtuber has not realised he can just carry on as before…
Airborne_Again wrote:
It still don’t understand how the UK can enforce that. They have no jurisdiction over sellers abroad.
No, but in general, a seller can not ask VAT in their own country for something exported. Same issue in Switzerland, if they ship here, they should actually deduct the EU VAT. Not all do, which in effect means they take money which does not belong to them as, unless they are totally stupid, they don´t have to pay it to the state.
Import duty in the UK would be HMC´s business to collect. At least that is what customs do over here with all shipments from abroad. A few years back, Switzerland abolished the “small sum” exception for this, which lead to some stores no longer shipping here, the most prominent one being Amazon.com. (DE and UK still do, even though a very limited stock).
Mooney_Driver wrote:
No, but in general, a seller can not ask VAT in their own country for something exported. Same issue in Switzerland, if they ship here, they should actually deduct the EU VAT. Not all do, which in effect means they take money which does not belong to them as, unless they are totally stupid, they don´t have to pay it to the state.Import duty in the UK would be HMC´s business to collect. At least that is what customs do over here with all shipments from abroad. A few years back, Switzerland abolished the “small sum” exception for this, which lead to some stores no longer shipping here, the most prominent one being Amazon.com. (DE and UK still do, even though a very limited stock).
From posts in other parts of this forum, my understanding now is that this is not enforced, nor is it actually a requirement at all. It is simply a way to avoid the procedure of collecting VAT at the border which would involve charging the buyer a substantial processing fee.
