Help needed with being Self Employed running a Ebay bussiness

buggu

I,m going to be made redundant pretty soon (about april time) and looking to set up an ebay business selling small general houselhold goods.

Have no clue where to start off finding information about what i need to be aware of in setting up a bussiness. can any one give me some pointers or direct me to some useful information, such as whether i need personal liability insurance and such.

Just worried i might rush into it without realizing about hidden costs or pitfalls.

Any help appreciated.

hermum

Hi, Business Link offer all sorts of courses for free to start your own business.
http://www.businesslink.gov.uk/bdotg/action/home?domain=www.businesslink.gov.uk&target=http://www.businesslink.gov.uk/
There's also all sorts of help on ebay help pages & in their forum

Good luck

paulwf

buggu wrote: »

I,m going to be made redundant pretty soon (about april time) and looking to set up an ebay business selling small general houselhold goods.

That instantly raises 2 questions:

- Are they the best things to sell on Ebay given they are low value but are reasonably bulky so will have high postage.

- Why would people buy these off Ebay when they are readily available in supermarkets and the high st in general? If people buy off Ebay why would they buy off a new company like yours when you have little buying power?

Have no clue where to start off finding information about what i need to be aware of in setting up a bussiness. can any one give me some pointers or direct me to some useful information, such as whether i need personal liability insurance and such.

Just worried i might rush into it without realizing about hidden costs or pitfalls.

Any help appreciated.

Becoming self employed is very easy, you phone up HMRC as soon as you start trading to register as self employed and set up a direct debit for your national insurance payments. You then keep a list of your income and expenses and fill in a tax return yearly. Simples!

However what I would do first before all that is buy 20 items (the same as you wish to sell) and sell them on Ebay. The wonderful thing about Ebay is that you can do a trial run to see if your concept works.

(Note: technically you should register with HMRC before you start your trial run. However in reality you are better off with a very short trial and then deciding otherwise you will be in the HMRC system for the next year at least).

Ebay fees are high, and combined with Paypal they are taking around a 15% cut. I haven't looked at the actual figure for a while, but that is a huge chunk from your net profit. Ebay is swamped now, to make money you either need a lot of buying power (buying in quantity direct from China) or have something unique such as creating art or jewelry or restoring antiques.

My opinion is you need to think your idea through in more depth, I really can't see it bringing in a significant income level. Sorry