VAT mismatch

[soisjack]

Anyone else who is VAT registered received an email from Ebay advising their VAT details are mismatche with HMRC . This happened 3 years ago and ebay admitted an error on their part back then . 

Again , the same today and all details I have match so cannot understand the issue. Been given a 30 day period to rectify but not rectifiable as I see it.

Anyone experiencing the same / can offer help here as want to avoid the issues from three years ago. Thanks 

[soisjack]

They told me exactly the same . I pushed the fact this all happened back in 2022 (no comment from advisor on this) , but I again stressed the message simply did not appear to be something to be forgotten about or worded as a reminder, as that's exactly what many were told in 2022 and look what happened 30 days later..... 

[strawberryk2]

Interestingly I have removed and re add my VAT number again this morning and not received any dreaded email from ebay - When I did this yesterday (multiple times) within 20 minutes or so received the dreaded email again. Not sure if this constitutes progress!

[w77raj]

Same problem. Was told by customer support it was an ebay issue. Now not showing my UK VAT number on my listings but still showing my ONE STOP SHOP VAT number for my EU sales. 

eBay need to step up and put out an announcement to put sellers at ease. This is my way of making a living. 

[tabletop-hobbies]

I have also received the same email yesterday, I've been recovering VAT and paying to HMRC for over a year, so my business is fully compliant.  Oddly there is nothing on my seller dashboard when i log in, just the external email.  I've checked through my details and i can't see anything wrong, I have a suspicion it might be some differently place space or something that is triggering the email.

I've heard about these issues before when a business gets all it's listing canned by the same issue despite being compliant.  This would destroy my business- someone from ebay help please!!

[tabletop-hobbies]

I think there are grounds for a litigation here if eBay doesn't sort it out PRONTO!!!!

[valcotrade]

What I find most frustrating is if they have found a mismatch or problem with our business information, VAT number or registered business address, why not tell us exactly what the mismatch or missing information is rather than make us search for it?

For example, our registered address in HMRC does not have a county, yet the eBay address does. Is this the problem? I don't know because eBay have just left us guessing.

Just think how many thousands of business hours are being wasted on this.

[tabletop-hobbies]

Perhaps 'sell similar' then 'save as a draft' would work, it might well be worth experimenting with before the deadline.

Presumably they won't delete drafts if they do delete live listings.

[tabletop-hobbies]

Hello Kat,

It would seem that the eBay bot that flags this issue up is somewhat over zealous and the flagged businesses need to be looked at by a human eye.  I very much hope that this issue is being taken seriously as I can remember the very negative effects that this issue had on other businesses 3 years ago when it happened last time, with businesses and the people who run them being driven to the wall due to what is effectively some poorly written computer script.

Please treat this with the utmost seriousness, livelihoods are at stake.

Best wishes

Neal

[retrogam3s]

Have just been back on the phone to CS and they said around 90% of the calls this morning were about this issue, so it would appear that the issue is very widespread.

They have acknowledged that there is indeed a technical issue and aim to fix this "within a week" - so we will wait and see.

I specifically asked if 30 days pass and this is still not resolved, will my account still be restricted? They said that if it was only my account with the issue then yes, but due to the vast amount of users phoning about this they "think" that we will receive a message from eBay telling us to disregard the restriction warning, and that nothing will happen.

Of course, take all of this with a pinch of salt and start preparing for the worst.

[valcotrade]

Thanks, I will take a look at save as draft as a backup option.

Somebody else also suggested getting an eBay Developer Account, so you can access the API. As an ex software developer I am going to try that option, but I realize it may not suit everybody.

[aspiredirectmarketing]

Good morning,

We had exactly the same email yesterday and checked / double checked and couldn't see an issue. We raised it with ebay on the phone in case we were missing something and they said there was an glitch in their system.

[tabletop-hobbies]

So checking through my details- my VAT registration address omits the county (West Midlands), but on Companies House the County is included.  If I try to edit the address on the HMRC website then it directs me to Companies House.  So HMRC isn't reading all the address info from Companies House, then eBay compares them and thinks something dodgy is going on.

[carparts-express]

Ive had exactly the same conversation and was told they should be sending another message when resolved. If they banned every business account ebay would go under pretty quickly

[vagbolts]

HMRC don't use Companies House for looking up the address for your VAT Registration.

Ebay just checks whatever address your eBay business account has with what's listed on the HMRC VAT registration lookup service.

HMRC use the address you provide, which you can change on your VAT account online gateway. The problem is HMRC do a lookup from a postcode when entering the address - which is based on the Royal Mail database. This entry may not have a county listed.

Ebay let you put whatever address you like in, however it is not based on a postcode lookup and it is mandatory to select a county from the list you provide.

So you can have a situation where the VAT registration has no county and Ebay's business address does as you MUST select a county from the list they provide.

If this is indeed the issue for some people, then the solution is for the developer that suddenly changed the system to check the whole address, including counties, to change it back!

[postgenesis]

On the email from ebay regarding mismatched information there is no mention about business address (and it having to be an exact match) , only the business name.

"Check the business name on your eBay account matches the company name on file with HMRC and Companies House. If all three locations don’t match, you need to update that information"

&

"Mismatched info? Confirm the business name on eBay matches the company name on HMRC and Companies House. "

[tabletop-hobbies]

Yes confirmed, eBay forces you to have a County in your address, while HMRC VAT does an automatic lookup based upon postcode and building number.  While HMRC VAT does allow you to edit the address, there is no line for county, which would normally be at the bottom above postcode, so putting it on another line would, I assume be seen as wrong anyway.

So somewhere along the line the address format has been changed which has thrown a spanner in the works.  Come on coders we've done half the job for you.....  (well @vagbolts did really)

[vagbolts]

99% of what the eBay developers do, they don't tell you about. This is an eBay classic where something has been changed, no one but the person who changed it knows about it, and it takes an eternity for them to find out why something is now broken.

This has happened time and time again over the years with various things - especially when working with the API, they are constantly doing undocumented things that breaks something. This unaccounted for tampering is throughout the entire system not just the API.

I don't know, but i strongly suspect that the problem is caused by a change that has tightened up what it checks, including the entire address entry. All because they have not said this in the email doesn't exclude it - in fact, based on their history, it is often better to look at what they didn't say, rather than what they say!

[papso22]

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@aspiredirectmarketing wrote:

Good morning,

We had exactly the same email yesterday and checked / double checked and couldn't see an issue. We raised it with ebay on the phone in case we were missing something and they said there was an glitch in their system.

---

But your VRN is not showing on your listings, that is the glitch.

[tabletop-hobbies]

The only difference regarding business name is that on HMRC and Companies House, it is all in capitals.  Same characters and spacing apart from that.  It might be worth looking into though as it is a difference.

[papso22]

How would an address mismatch result in ebay removing the VRN from the business contact section of a listing?