When the Regulatory Operating Fee was introduced in April 2024 it applied to every account - both Business and Private - and the charge, supposedly, covered the cost of reporting sales data to HMRC under the new UK digital sales reporting requirements.
Although the Regulatory Operating Fee was subsequently dropped for Private sellers when eBay scrapped sellers' fees it remains for Business sellers, which is itself somewhat curious: how come it costs eBay to report business sales to HMRC but not private sales, especially when Private sellers (including businesses trading on Private accounts) are the ones most likely to be avoiding declaring income?
The other issue is one of cost: the Fee is 0.35% of the total amount of each sale. A computer extract file only needs to be written once so the cost is fixed, but eBay's ongoing charge for the 'service' of reporting sales is, quite simply, a fee-grab.
The Regulatory Operating Fee in its current form is iniquitous in that it is only paid by businesses, the accounts least likely to under-declare income for tax purposes. I wrote (to a friend) when it was introduced that introducing the fee was just cynical opportunism by eBay who saw it as a way to increase income whilst blaming 'circumstances beyond their control'. I have seen nothing to disabuse me of that belief.
Still: it's eBay's site, eBay's rules. Other selling platforms are available...
