EBay asking for national insurance number

[raik1performance]

Hi everyone, I recently joined for like 1 month and I start selling as a private seller , and now eBay is asking me to provide national insurance number.

"New UK digital sales reporting legislation requires sellers with 30 or more sales, or who have sales exceeding £1740 in a calendar year, to register this information"

[*devils.advocate*]

Bottom line.

If eBay ask you for your National Insurance Number, there’s a choice.

Either give it and continue selling or don’t give it and stop selling.

Whether there’s a requirement, obligation or any other words to describe the situation - it doesn’t matter - who cares?.

All boils down to individual choice - give it or don’t give it.

That’s it.

[laneanddodgey]

Well, if you worked at the HMRC and you were given all a sellers details
and more importantly all the sellers sales I’m pretty sure the most
important thing would be the income from those sales.

If the figure was a £1800 and you still interested in spending £2000 in
resources figuring out a sellers net profit of £100,
then I doubt you’d be working there very long.

A lot of people are selling items they’ve already bought and are now
selling at a loss because they are having a clear out, and the HMRC are
very aware of this and have no interest in looking into several million
cases of pin-money earnings.

If sellers wish to give eBay their NI info then they can, but for those who
do not they are under no obligation to do so as eBay is not legally
entitled to sellers NI numbers.

[vinylscot]

I know that you and a number of other posters are simply stirring here, dancing on the head of a pin. When it boils down to it, it makes little difference in practice.

eBay IS legally obliged to obtain your NINO, IF you exceed the thresholds, and IF you wish to continue to sell on eBay. eBay appears to be complying, by making it clear that those who fail to provide the information, when requested, will no longer be allowed to sell on eBay, and their details will still be reported to HMRC, with a note stating that you have refused to provide your NINO.

If you decide not to provide the NINO to eBay, HMRC will still be able to match up your eBay activity with your tax file, but it will not be so automated, as HMRC's records are, in many cases, many years out of date. Those who refuse to comply will, almost certainly, be flagged up for the attention of HMRC's staff, who will investigate further, to see if the individual has something to hide, or if they are just an obstinate fool. In either case, it's not going to put HMRC in a good mood, and I think that's a mistake.

I also assume none of those moaning about supplying their NINO have ever worked for an organisation smaller than a multi-national corporation. More local employers, and smaller companies, even nationwide in size, will not have anything approaching the security level of eBay, and you would quite happily have supplied your NINO, in order to receive your salary. In addition, the accountants used by such smaller outfits are unlikely to have such tight security, and very possibly won't even have the means to detect if they have been "hacked". If you've had a few jobs, your NINO is out there, often in hands far less secure than eBay's.

This is a complete non-issue. It is non-negotiable, and in no way the fault of eBay. And before anyone jumps in, it doesn't matter a jot what eBid are doing; or Vinted; or anywhere else, for that matter.

[specialk1937]

I realised that name and addresses' are held by 'ebay but was once told
that online platforms were in breach of privacy laws if they were to
divulge personal details, about a persons bank, date of birth or address to
anyone. Not being an authority on legal matters I assumed this to be
true! Perhaps thats why they are asking for NI Numbers so that they can
then claim they are freely given!
I am not suggesting that HMRC are totally disinterested in all of this, but
when I was recently in correspondence with them, they gave me the
impression that they felt they were 'piggy in the middle' in what is going
on, and told me if I was just selling off my personal possessions that I
would not be liable for tax anyway!
In the wake of all this plus the imposition a Buyers Protection Fee that
crippled my sales, then messing around with postal arrangements, I have now
stopped selling on eBay, so I have no intention of giving them my NI
Number, and NO, I have got nothing to hide! On the 21 years I have been
selling on eBay, all my sales have been from from my private collection of
LP records and more recently CD's and DVD's. In short, I have been a
collector for 65 years now and living in a small cottage, I found in recent
times to have reached saturation point, with no room for anymore shelves.
So it became necessary for me to prune things out However, I have now
reached a point where, I would prefer to give some of my things away,
rather than have all this hassle with eBay.
I feel that eBay has a downer on Private Sellers, and they would be quite
happy to be get rid of us. Even some Business Sellers look down their nose
at us, and think that we just sell 'tat'which I strongly resent! So having
closed my seller account in May on my 88th Birthday, I feel a tremendous
weight has been lifted off my shoulders Perhaps now, I can enjoy what's
left of my life!
eBay was once a good experience, but it all went sour in the end!

[laneanddodgey]

I think you should give up.

I have no idea why you can’t understand.
eBay can only ask a seller for NI information they can’t demand it with any
legal backing!

So if it is a legal requirement for them to obtain a sellers NI and they
don’t get it because the seller refuses to supply it what what exactly are
eBay guilty of in failing in this legal requirement??

Maybe you should copy and paste the section of the legislation where is
states that a platform must get a sellers NI and what the consequences
will be if they don’t ?

[papso22]

The HMRC link has already been provided.  The information about due diligence and fines for non compliance are in HMRC's internal guidance, which is publicly available. 

We know ebay have no legal vires to demand a NI number, but they have a legal obligation to provide it to HMRC with the sales data.  That puts them in a difficult position, as it leaves them with the legal consequences if sellers refuse. 

[jonatjonatjonat]

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/reporting-rules-for-digital-platforms#what-you-need-to-report

so they need to report a national insurance number 

if a record is incomplete they may receive a penalty of £100 per record. Which would also explain the withholding funds

[laneanddodgey]

It makes no difference to me what you want to believe in. But peddling
rubbish about what the HMRC will do if an eBay seller doesn’t supply them
with a N I number pretty much sums up what you know.

The HMRC will look at the sales and the money they generated and in many
cases they will not be in the least bit interested.

You are clearly out of your depth here
so perhaps you shouldn’t get involved in things you don’t understand.

Sometimes I will attempt to help idiots and sometimes I won’t.

Now one last time:
There is no obligation to supply a seller NI
to eBay.

End of debate

[vinylscot]

You really shouldn't need this spelled out to you in words of one syllable, and I strongly suspect that you don't, but here we go, one more time.

eBay is legally required to obtain a seller's NINO IF that seller is to continue selling on eBay once they have reached the thresholds which have been set up. eBay is not allowing such sellers to continue to sell on eBay, and is therefore complying with the legislation.

If they were to continue allowing such sellers to sell on their platform, without obtaining their NINOs, then they would be in breach of the legislation, but they are not doing so.

Now, my goldfish can understand that, so I'm quite sure you can, or am I being a little presumptuous?

[laneanddodgey]

The legal consequences pass from eBay to the seller. HMRC have no legal
power to make eBay obtain a seller NI or for a seller to provide eBay with
it.

[jonatjonatjonat]

that isn’t up for debate. Of course HMRC can’t do anything in a legal way to force eBay to obtain a NI number

but they can fine ebay

as such eBay can withhold funds and adjudge their Ts&Cs in such a way to make providing the NINO a requirement to sell and receive funds from the platform. While it’s not forcing, it’s certainly being as persuasive as they can be with the methods at their disposal

[*devils.advocate*]

What has any of this to do with helping people make up their minds of what to do?

Threads usually get closed when this one has gone the way it has.

A shame if that happens. 

[moonlight-rhapsody]

---

@jonatjonatjonat wrote:

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/reporting-rules-for-digital-platforms#what-you-need-to-report

This isn't the first time that the above link, and others, have been posted to the HMRC web site, and it's a bit baffling that there still seems to be a debate about it.  All the information on the government web site seems pretty straightforward to me, as do the penalties which ebay faces if they do not comply with the rules laid down by the government as a result of the OECD decision.  The penalties are copied below.

-----------------

Penalties

If you [ed. meaning ebay] do not follow the rules, you may be charged 3 types of penalty:

• a penalty of up to £1,000 for not telling HMRC if you’re a reporting platform operator or excluded platform operator
• an initial penalty of up to £5,000 and a continuing penalty of up to £600 per day for not reporting by the 31 January reporting deadline
• a penalty of up to £100 for each inaccurate, incomplete, or unverified seller’s record

If sellers do not cooperate, you may want to consider actions such as:

• limiting their access until you collect the information
• stopping them registering on your platform

-----------------

Of course ebay can't force anyone to give them their NINO, but they need to show HMRC that they have at least attempted to obtain it, and what action they have taken against anyone who refuses - ie preventing them from selling.

It's possible that other platforms which haven't yet asked for NINOs are waiting until nearer the 31 January deadline.

[laneanddodgey]

Of course it’s not up for debate.

HMRC can fine eBay but only if the requirements, in this case obtaining
sellers NI, have not been attempted or other breaches via the eBay person
in charge of the legislation’s Due Diligence in getting relevant info to
them on time.

[ett1954]

“The legal consequences pass from eBay to the seller” - This is partly correct however I am not aware that anyone in recent posts has suggested that eBay has a legal obligation to acquire the NINO from a seller.  What eBay have to do under the legislation, the links to which have been provided in several posts, is request the NINO from a seller once the reporting thresholds are met.

if eBay fail to supply the NINO with the sales report they can face a penalty unless they can show due diligence in attempting to obtain the NINO.  Two of the ways they can do this are through the holding of payouts or by suspending a seller’s selling activities.

This leads any seller with a straightforward choice of refusing to provide the NINO, which they are fully entitled to do, with the resultant holding of payouts or suspension of further selling activity.  At the end of the day it is the seller’s choice bearing in mind that the selling activity will still be reported to HMRC albeit with a non-compliance tag where the NINO information is concerned.

[lucy_farmer]

Taxi!   Taxi for Albert........ Albert Ross!

[jckl1957]

Just to confirm for anyone reading this thread - this is what Ebay supply:

Taken from:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/help/account/regulatory/sales-reporting/uk-digital-sales-reporting?id=5454

[vinylscot]

There is also a bit of an assumption going on that HMRC "won't bother" if it's just a "little bit" that would be due in tax.

I don't think you could be more wrong.

It would make far more sense, from their point of view, for HMRC to recoup a large total of tax due quickly, unearthed from the simple straightforward cases, many of them small individually, such as those who have provided their NINOs to the selling platforms. It will give them a huge initial money grab and clear up a lot of their workload, while letting people know that they "mean business". No doubt there will be much media attention at this point.

Obviously, they won't cover everyone at once. It will take time, and their initial contact will offer a chance for the seller to explain; although it may look like it (and although many may well pay), the first contact will not be a demand for payment.

I acknowledge that it may take a little longer to get around to those who refused to divulge their NINOs but please don't think these individuals are not going to receive "special" treatment, after HMRC has had to expend time and manpower collating all their information. Once the info is all collated, it's a virtual push of a button to get things rolling, and you can be sure that the over-cautious fools who refused to divulge their NINOs are not going to receive any favours from HMRC. If HMRC needs to spend time on your account, they will go after their pound of flesh. They're not going to sit back and congratulate you on your ingenuity.

You can carry on playing silly games with semantics all you want. It changes nothing.

Little people like you very rarely win against HMRC. They can chew you up and spit you out without breaking sweat. And they never forget.

In real life, I'm sure most of those moaning about it have actually supplied their NINOs if requested. Certainly many have continued to sell. Of course you CAN be awkward and refuse, but honestly, what's the point?

[specialk1937]

Too many words have been spoken here on this subject, when there's only one
question that needs to be addressed:-
IS EBAY ASKING FOR NATIONAL INSURANCE NUMBERS AN INFRNGEMENT OF THE DATA
PROTECTION ACT?

HMRC will already have this information anyway, as will your employer. so
it needs to be established as to whether anyone else has any right to ask
for it!
Also can't agree about HMRC chewing you up. I have been in correspondence
with them on this subject and they have assured me that if I am selling off
some of my own possessions I will not be liable to tax

[vinylscot]

As earlier, at this point it's all just petty semantics, and it really doesn't matter.

An online forum filled with randoms is not where you'll get definitive answers to your DPA question. There are other avenues available which will lead you to the answer on that. But you don't really want the answer, do you? You just want to continue sowing alarmist discord for your own amusement.

And regarding your own pre-emptive contact with HMRC; what do you expect them to do? At this point you're in contact with them on a theoretical point. i.e. that you are selling personal items. If it was as simple as that, everyone would do that, and HMRC would get nothing. If you exceed the thresholds, you will hear from them at some time, whether or not you have provided your NINO to HMRC.