ebay and selling

[leemack]

If you're just selling your own things then you're fine - its not counted as income, I think it just adds to capital.

[leemack]

capital what is that leemack is their a amount that i can only reach say 500 or 1000 pounds sorry about asking but i am desperate

 

The savings limits start at £6000. Make sure you keep printouts and details of what you've sold in case it ever gets queried.

 

What you need to make sure of is that you're selling your own stuff. If you buy things for the intent of selling things on for profit, then that would be generating income and would need to be declared as such.

[leemack]

If you started selling stuff regularly then it would be classed as a business, ebay car boot sales etc.

If you buy to sell then it's trading and a business.

 

If a person just wants to sell off some household items then that's not a business.

 

It doesn't matter about regularity, it matters whether its personal possesions or whether the person has purchased items with the intent of reselling at a profit.

 

You can sell as many personal possessions as you like over whatever period you like - as long as you declare any capital (savings) increases that may affect income based benefit.

[leemack]

They would look at how regular it was.

You could claim you were buying items, then sold them as you no longer wanted them and that would be fine.

But if you kept doing it regularly then they would be classing that as trading

 

No. There is a difference between being perceived by the DWP as possibly contravening regulations and actually contravening regulations, and also there is a difference between not doing anything wrong, and making up a story to cover benefit fraud. Certain behaviours may provoke further investigation.

 

If someone sells (for instance) all of their dvds and cds over the course of two years, that would be regular selling but not trading and could not be counted as income.

 

If someone regularly went to car boot sales and purchased dvds and then sold them on then that could be considered to be trading - however if the claimant can prove that there was no profit, and the intention was to buy the dvd to watch - then its still not income.

 

The thing that the DWP have to prove is intention. If these are items that were purchased a long time ago, before claiming benefit, then it is pretty much impossible to claim that they were purchased with the intent to sell for profit regardless over what time period they were sold.

 

If someone is buying items while on benefit and then selling them on, there are two options, either they purchased them to use and then once used, had no further need so sold them. Or they are doing it as benefit fraud and are CLAIMING the items are for personal use. Either way the DWP would investigate this situation, and it may well go to a tribunal. At tribunal imagine two different scenarios - number 1 - the person has been buying cds at car boot sales and then selling them on ebay. At tribunal (or even before) they provide records showing the cds were purchased and sold for 50p each and show that all the cds were ripped onto his computer - and explains this was his purpose, to obtain the tracks for his collection, once he has ripped the cd's, he no longer needs them. The tribunal would find in his favour. Scenario number 2 - The person has been buying cd's at car boot sales and then selling them on ebay. At tribunal the dwp show that the cd's had been purchased for 20-50p each and sold for £1 each, and in addition the postage costs charged were in excess of what they actually cost, making in total a profit of up to £1.20 on each cd. The person does not provide any evidence at tribunal except to say that they were for personal use and he sold them on after listening to them. The tribunal would decide on a balance of probabilities that the person had been trading and should have declared his income - he also might face prosecution.

 

Can you see there is a difference between what may be suspect behaviour and what the actual regulations state. I'm telling you that regardless of time period the regulations state that if you're selling personal items, then that is not considered to be income.

 

Whether or not the dwp would want to investigate a long term selling off of personal items is a different matter - but as long as the person could prove they had done nothing wrong - for instance receipts, records of transactions, bankstatements etc then there should be no problem.

[leemack]

What I am saying if a person bought an item (say a necklace) for a tenner wore it once then sold it for £100 that's fine.

If a person bought a necklace 3 times a week wore it once each time and sold it for £100 each time it would be classed as trading.

Same event, but done regularly then the rules change.

 

No I think that's called fraud - if someone buys and sells 3 necklaces a week while on benefits and claims it was to wear them once, no one is ever going to believe they were purchased as personal items.

 

But you're talking about a pattern of buying AND selling. If you are just selling items you own already you can do that within the rules over whatever time period you like.

 

Also any time you buy something for considerably less than you sell it for is going to raise alarms. And even if you buy one thing and sell it on for a profit - if that was the intention all along then selling that one thing is still trading - even if they try and make up the 'I brought it to wear once' excuse. It wouldn't be considered reasonable that someone on £65 a week benefits would pay £10 for a necklace they only planned on wearing once.