Ebay prices crack me up!

[Ba r r y]

That depends on the tax.

Sales tax is not "paid" by a merchant, it's collected from the buyer and forwarded on to a taxing authority.

If the seller is keeping books, the $15,000 shipping charge would probably result in some sort of profit, which _can be_ taxable, depending on the structure of the business and the conditions on how the money is taken out of the business, such as owner's dividends, salaries, etc...

Barry (being stupidly hypothetical, since we've moved to the stupidly hypothetical world...)

[A.M. Wood]

"It's very dishonest when you realize that the seller is only paying "taxes" on the $100 and is getting the $15,000 completely tax-free because it's counted as shipping."

Maybe somewhere that is true. But here in the U.S. that shipping revenue is included in the calculation of taxable profits. The seller most definitely is required to pay income tax on that income.

[A.M. Wood]

"It's very dishonest when you realize that the seller is only paying "taxes" on the $100 and is getting the $15,000 completely tax-free because it's counted as shipping."

Maybe somewhere that is true. But here in the U.S. that shipping revenue is included in the calculation of taxable profits. The seller most definitely is required to pay income tax on that income.

[A.M. Wood]

"It's very dishonest when you realize that the seller is only paying "taxes" on the $100 and is getting the $15,000 completely tax-free because it's counted as shipping."

Maybe somewhere that is true. But here in the U.S. that shipping revenue is included in the calculation of taxable profits. The seller most definitely is required to pay income tax on that income.

[A.M. Wood]

"It's very dishonest when you realize that the seller is only paying "taxes" on the $100 and is getting the $15,000 completely tax-free because it's counted as shipping."

Maybe somewhere that is true. But here in the U.S. that shipping revenue is included in the calculation of taxable profits. The seller most definitely is required to pay income tax on that income.

[A.M. Wood]

"It's very dishonest when you realize that the seller is only paying "taxes" on the $100 and is getting the $15,000 completely tax-free because it's counted as shipping."

Maybe somewhere that is true. But here in the U.S. that shipping revenue is included in the calculation of taxable profits. The seller most definitely is required to pay income tax on that income.

[A.M. Wood]

"It's very dishonest when you realize that the seller is only paying "taxes" on the $100 and is getting the $15,000 completely tax-free because it's counted as shipping."

Maybe somewhere that is true. But here in the U.S. that shipping revenue is included in the calculation of taxable profits. The seller most definitely is required to pay income tax on that income.

[A.M. Wood]

"It's very dishonest when you realize that the seller is only paying "taxes" on the $100 and is getting the $15,000 completely tax-free because it's counted as shipping."

Maybe somewhere that is true. But here in the U.S. that shipping revenue is included in the calculation of taxable profits. The seller most definitely is required to pay income tax on that income.

[A.M. Wood]

"It's very dishonest when you realize that the seller is only paying "taxes" on the $100 and is getting the $15,000 completely tax-free because it's counted as shipping."

Maybe somewhere that is true. But here in the U.S. that shipping revenue is included in the calculation of taxable profits. The seller most definitely is required to pay income tax on that income.

[TomL]

How do you report these issues to Ebay. I keep looking for the "Contact Us About This Item" or the "Report Ebay Violation" buttons but they seem to be eluding me..

[Upscale]

Not these labels you can't buy in Walmart, but appreciate the sentiment.

[Ralph E Lindberg]

..

Not one penny, nor do they charge a fee on "handling" charges

[Ralph E Lindberg]

..

In this case, it's eBay's sellers fee. There isn't one on handling chargers.

[Ralph E Lindberg]

...

It's a rule change I am also expecting, since it is costing the revenue. Like their rule change (a few years ago) on extra charges for the % PayPal gets (but only for high dollar/volume sellers)

[Leuf]

have to open the "additonal information" tab. I agree they aren't going out of their way to make this accessible, but if they had a button on the auction page they'd get 100k complaints a day 5% of which would be valid.

You see the bogus shipping charges the most on things that there are a lot of competing sellers. Not only do they get more profit by avoiding fees, they get you to click on their auction instead of the other guys because of their lower price. Consequently everyone selling that item has to do it too.

If you look at postal scales, almost everyone is trying to charge you an additional fee for the a/c adapter that comes in the box.

-Leuf

[Brian Elfert]

I have never used the shipping calculator. I just use a flat fee that sometimes makes me a few bucks and sometimes I lose a few bucks depending on the buyer's location.

The shipping calculator can have handling fees added to the actual cost of shipping. This way, the seller can rip off all buyers equally! With fixed shipping, the shipping "profit" can be more or less depending on the actual shipping charges.

Brian Elfert

[Joe Barta]

He figgered what every other seller figgers... they'd sell more with a lower price. My have sold even more if he had just listed them as free with $6.50 shipping. Or maybe free, AND he'd throw in a $5 gift certificate for Dennys... just pay the $11.50 shipping. Nothing unethical about that, is there? Errthing up front, ain't it?

[Joe Barta]

Probably the most important bit of advice. Like the guy that spends $59.95 on a magic cream that will grow hair on his bald spot in 10 days. When it doesn't, he feels ripped off. When the company jerks him around about a refund, he feels ripped off. In my opinion the dude ripped his own fool self off the minute he paid money for a magic cream that he KNEW wasn't going to work.

It never ceases to amaze me the mentality that some folk have. This way of thinking that absolves them of any responsibility when things go wrong. Buyer be ware. And as a great man once said... "If it smells like bad fish, it probably is bad fish."

-Joe Barta

[canadian_woodworker]

wow - my S/H woes got more responses than I expected - no time to read through them all "_

Anyway, im not bitching about the person who charges a couple bucks handling fees - it makes sense and is fine to offset the cost/gas of going to the post office, time spent foing so, etc.

My complaint was soley for the people (and there are plenty of these on EBay) who try to hook you with a an item thats:

- Worth around $50.00

- Auction is listed for $10.00

- And hope people wont notice the $75.00 shipping and handling fee.

[Enoch Root]

Shipping isn't tax-free.

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