How can I obtain a VAT receipt for eBay for Royal Mail Postage purchased via ebay?

[lincolnshiremarine]

Good morning

Can anyone advise how I obtain from eBay or find anywhere on the system a VAT receipt for the eBay Royal mail postage charges.

When you purchase a parcel from Royal Mail directly, you are sent a receipt that clearly lists the VAT separately and this invoice can be used to claim the VAT back.

However, as we are purchasing the Royal Mail postage via eBay, as it is easier, we are missing out on claiming the VAT back as we cannot seem to find any invoices that relate to the postage costs.

I have asked the chat team on Wednesday,  and they claim eBay do not offer this service, which I find strange.

Has anyone found a way to navigate this?

Best wishes

[thesmokingrunner]

Hi @lincolnshiremarine 

Just to prove I was paying attention on Wednesday I've just checked back and Marco posted a response at 15:47 (Message #30) :

Hi lincolnshiremarine, thanks for your patience on this.

I've just checked there again, and we wouldn't have a VAT one. We only have the one you can get through the legacy tool as shown in the screenshot below. 

Hope this helps,

Marco

I'm really not sure if that is a solution to your issue, though, as I read it as you need a VAT invoice and I'm not sure that Marco's suggestion fits the bill.

[arkwebus]

Here is a link to what is VATable with Royal Mail and what is not.  Complex!

My reading is that letters and ordinary parcels are exempt as are stamps.  It's only when you start getting Premium services as opposed to Universal service that VAT is charged ...

https://www.royalmail.com/information-vat-and-postal-services.

@lincolnshiremarine 

[lincolnshiremarine]

Good evening,

Thank you for replying.

Letters are not rated for VAT, however, tracked parcels from "small parcel" upwards have VAT charged.

Purchasing directly from Royal Mail provides a VAT receipt, but this is a lengthy process compared to using eBay postage, where all the customer details are prefilled.

It is ridiculous that eBay do not provide a VAT receipt for an item that has VAT charged. We are missing out on a substantial amount of money not be reclaimed if eBay postage is used.

Best wishes

[rbtx99]

The HMRC website states that you can resell zero-rated Royal Mail postage to your customer without adding VAT as long as the amount you charge remains the same.  eBay charges for postage the same amount as the Royal Mail, thus, it is reasonable to assume that no VAT is added. 

Also, if you pay for the stamps using PayPal, go to PayPal and open the transaction. This resembles an invoice, showing "Invoice ID" and a breakdown of product costs and VAT. These details are sent to PayPal from eBay, I know this because our online store does the same.