list pricing problem...

[coxandbudgebooks]

Can I ask a favour - can some of you check the following listing:

'M L HASKINS signed Through Beds of Stone 1928 1st HB Minnie Louise Haskins', item no 376155054204.

It's listed for £95, is showing in My Ebay as £95, but in search results, it's £114... (see pics)

Is this what others are seeing? 

Many thanks in advance.

[coxandbudgebooks]

No, I ended it again. Maybe third time lucky....

[pillarboxred]

I can see it as a Buy It Now for £114. I would like to know why "Margaret" in the novel has the letter from John Raynor lying unopened in front of her when, in the next paragraph we learn that his letters brought her joy? Is that normal behaviour? Don't we usually tear open any letter that portends joy? Haskins must have admirers.

[coxandbudgebooks]

An update! There is certainly something peculiar going on here (apart from Margaret's attitude to correspondence)... I listed the book four times, sometimes from scratch, sometimes overwriting an existing listing, and the same thing happened: £95 to £114, as well as postage £3.50 to £4.20. 

Then I tried listing 10 different books in various ways, they were all fine, displaying as they should.

Then I tried my second M L Haskins book (A Few People) for £30, and blow me, it happened again, shows up at £36. The old 20% trick again.

So there is some trigger in "M L HASKINS" that is making ebay have vat spasms. It's a funny old world. 

[the-nutwood-collection]

Is the VAT Rate on the listing set to 0%?

[coxandbudgebooks]

Yep, various permutations - left it empty (as it usually is, working fine), set at 0%, the strange this is fine on all books listed either side, it's just M L Haskins seems to get ebay's pricing / VAT thingy in a twist

[jlovie]

Have you tried altering the title, even temporarily taking Haskins out of it?

It's certainly a weird one!

[pillarboxred]

Try once more editing the listing but crawl down the listing flow slowly looking at every line, every option to see whether you have a default setting you didn't notice or  choose. EBay is now making suggestions and some of them you might have to opt out of. If there isn't something there that you didn't notice maybe the system is broken. Signing out and clearing History, Cache and Cookies is one way to ensure you are not being served old data. Updating your operating system and browser to the latest version sometimes works. Giving up is another option I try to avoid but it is always there.

[coxandbudgebooks]

Thing is, I've listed a few either side of this and the other M L Haskins title and they're fine. I've edited, cleared cookies, re-signed in, crept up on the listing when it's not looking... Everyone is making good suggestions which should work but looks like ebay have it in for poor old Minnie Haskins. 

Though the one thing I haven't tried yet is taking the author's name out of the title yet. 

[the-nutwood-collection]

Maybe poor old Minnie Haskins is fed up of moving, and wants to make your house her forever home.

[sml192]

Have you changed something as 'Through Beds of Stone' is now showing correctly at £95 with no VAT added? 

The other M L Haskins one is still showing with VAT added though. 

Doing a search for M L Haskins I can see that someone else has a copy of 'Through Beds of Stone' listed which is also showing with VAT added so it's not just you experiencing this problem. 

Ebay is showing it as VAT collected by them rather than the seller.  They should only be using the 'item location' and 'seller location' fields to determine whether they need to collect VAT but it appears something else is triggering it. 

The common denominator does seem to be the word 'Haskins' (Haskins is a village in Ohio and also an area in Iowa) but that really shouldn't have any bearing.  It really is most peculiar! 

[technthread]

I thought earlier what if there are previous solds for M L Haskins books in the high thousands and so eBay have a suggested price so high that it triggers the VAT that way. I checked Terapeak quickly and dropped that idea as not being backed up but it could be something weird along those lines. 

[coxandbudgebooks]

I fiddled around with the title three times, the biggest change being to put "Signed book" as the opening, so maybe that worked. Still, if problem solved, that's good. Thanks for checking again. 

I've made the same change to the M L Haskins I've listed, that hasn't worked yet but needs time to filter through. 

Thanks again to all for help and suggestions. 

[sml192]

The other M L Haskins is showing correctly now aswell so something you did worked. 

[4_bathrooms]

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@coxandbudgebooks wrote:

I fiddled around with the title three times, the biggest change being to put "Signed book" as the opening, so maybe that worked. Still, if problem solved, that's good. Thanks for checking again. 

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This is weird. You're right - it's the author (M L Haskins) that is prompting eBay to needlessly charge and remit VAT. I've found another business seller who is selling Through Beds of Stone - the title of their listing is: "Through Beds of Stone by M. L Haskins - 1928 First Edition - A Novel". Although their listing does not start with the author's name and the item location is Carlisle eBay are still unnecessarily charging VAT for some reason.

[coxandbudgebooks]

I just hope this isn't going to turn into one of those 'Three Days of the Condor' kind of days...

[jlovie]

Not sure if it's a related problem but I was searching locally for a car and one from a private seller is showing VAT to be added in the search page.

[4_bathrooms]

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@jlovie wrote:

Not sure if it's a related problem but I was searching locally for a car and one from a private seller is showing VAT to be added in the search page.

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The seller of that vehicle is located in France although that shouldn't make any difference. The vehicle is located in the UK and has a UK licence plate so even if it has been imported - which seems unlikely as it is RHD - any import VAT & Customs Duty due would have already been paid. Strangely that is a classified ad with cash on collection as the payment method; there is no way for eBay to force the buyer to pay any (undue) VAT.

The OP's problem is eBay were - for some unknown reason linked to the book author's name - going to charge their buyer VAT and remit it themselves even though no VAT would have been due on the sale.  

[megan1512]

Found this from 2004
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eBay UK VAT Glitch Stalls Sales With Inflated Prices Shown In Error On Some Listings

Liz Morton

Published: Sep 2 2024 Updated: Sep 8 2024 

eBay UK sellers worry about losing sales as some items show inflated prices due to glitch adding additional 20% VAT in error.

The problem has persisted for several weeks now, with eBay customer service and community staff acknowledging it's a known problem but they are unable to provide a timeline for a fix.

Over the last 12/14 hours Ive found over half my listings have increase with price (had VAT added to actual listing price).

When i go to edit a listing it shows at the price I have set but when search for it it shows it more expensive...

...Cant seem to chat any CS on auto chat or request a call back.

The few sales I have done over night have been charge at the amount I put not the extra being advertised - anyone else seem to have this?

Perfect. On the last sales day of the month. I've just checked mine and I have had vat applied to some of my listings I've also noticed that a couple of my buyers have been charged sales tax

Surely this has big tax regulation implications. This glitch should be fixed immediately

why does eBay have so many of these glitches
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Why have all my eBay listings now have VAT added to them ? I am based in the uk and only sell my own personal used items.

I am facing the same issue. I have thousands of listings and I am not sure how many are impacted but it seems that it is a big percentage. As you understand this is impacting my sales in a negative way.

The listing has 20% VAT set in the VAT field but eBay still adds 20% on top of that. If the VAT is set at 0% the VAT is still being added.

Alarmingly, this appears to be an ongoing sporadic issue that has lasted for years as the latest problem revived an eBay UK community thread from 2022 with almost 300 previous posts from sellers impacted by the problem.

Community rep Marco replied to that thread today to acknowledge eBay is aware and working on the glitch, but had no further details to provide.
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Thanks very much for still flagging this with us. I've just checked for an update, and the team is currently working on it, and trying to resolve this as soon as possible, but I still don't have an estimated fix time. As soon I find out more about this, I will post back here to let you know.

Meanwhile, helpful sellers shared workaround suggestions, with many saying they were able edit listings individually or open their listings in the bulk editor and simply hit "save" without making any changes to trigger a revision that set the price back to what is should be without the additional incorrect VAT added - though they did warn if you use the bulk option it may take 5-10 minutes to see the changes reflected on the listings.