Anybody clarify this HMRC thought question ?

[chapman726xd]

In a fever dream l wondered if, within a year with no sales, l sold a watch for £2000, thereby going over the money threshold, Ebay would notify HMRC , and HMRC could/would then request a self assessment form ?, even without selling another item for the rest of the year.

                Irritatingly the HMRC website state mechanical watches are classed as tax free for selling purposes, and as a private seller looking to downsize my watch collection, can l only sell one per year and nothing else !! .  Frankly l am just about calling it quits on selling, like the rest of the community. 

Any advice gratefully received. Ben

[papso22]

So far we have no evidence of what HMRC will do when they get the online sales data from the various sources that are required to provide it.

We do know that the usual HMRC response when HMRC has information that piques its interest is to write and ask for further information to see whether it's trading income.  They don't go straight into requesting a self assessment form because if it's not trading income then SA would be wrong.

For that one watch Ebay would include your data due to breaching the £ threshold, but if it was an unwanted personal possession then no tax is due and HMRC are extremely unlikely to do anything with the information.  If you sell off a collection then they might be more interested but that doesn't mean any tax is due.

Mechanical watches are Capital Gains Tax free, not Income Tax free by the way.

[lucy_farmer · Accepted solution]

Ebay will have to pass your info to the HMRC because you've passed the limit.

BUT :

If you are a genuine private seller.

If the watch is genuinely your own personal possession.

If you haven't been buying for the purposes of selling on.....

Then No, you won't owe any tax, and won't have to do a self-assessment.

If you sell the watch for over £6000.00 you would be in Capital Gains territory and have to pay CGT tax. (but would you be happy with such an expensive sale on ebay? 😱)

If HMRC think there's something a bit dodgy about your selling (i.e. they can see you've bought loads of new, similar items, then quickly sold them on; yeah they may well want to have a closer look at you)  but if you are truthfully not  trading you won't owe them money.

[*vyolla*]

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@chapman726xd wrote:

In a fever dream l wondered if, within a year with no sales, l sold a watch for £2000, thereby going over the money threshold, Ebay would notify HMRC , and HMRC could/would then request a self assessment form ?, even without selling another item for the rest of the year.

                Irritatingly the HMRC website state mechanical watches are classed as tax free for selling purposes, and as a private seller looking to downsize my watch collection, can l only sell one per year and nothing else !! .  Frankly l am just about calling it quits on selling, like the rest of the community. 

Any advice gratefully received. Ben

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Unlikely if it's your own watch, there'd be no tax to pay and no self assessment required.

As clarified by @papso22 , watches are free from Capital Gains tax, which is completely different to personal tax. 

[chapman726xd]

Great substantial answer, it was my wishthat the was the case. Hopefully this helps clarify for others. Thank u.

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[chapman726xd]

Thank you, another great answer that validates another response from another experienced member. My faith in the community seems to be restored. Best wishes, Ben

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