Do you make money selling clothes on ebay?

Strapped

soolin wrote: »

Just a tip as well, if you are going to go down this route, and I must say it makes me uncomfortable, remember to register with HMRC and pay NI as appropriate as otherwise I think you would be hard pressed to show a legitimate intention to trade. Same goes for running a proper ebay business account doing this on a private account would surely look like fraud?

Register with HMRC but remember you can claim small earnings exemption from NI liability.

Also, if you are a carer remember that you can earn up to £100 per week and still receive Carer's Allowance. So part-time trading on eBay can work well in these circumstances. (Did for me when starting off!)

I don't sell clothes though. I'd imagine it incredibly difficult to get stock from charity shops, many of whom are themselves active on eBay.

Crowqueen

Yes - many people, not all of them who realise what they are doing is trading pick over charity shops.

It might be as well to investigate wholesalers so you can buy up items cheap enough to resell properly rather than carry on trying to scrape an income from charity shops - particularly as clothes buyers are notoriously picky and can wipe out earnings with returns requests with which you have to comply. The DSRs changing from next year (2013) which makes all sales, auction or fixed price, subject to change-of-mind returns will probably mean that selling old clothes becomes much, much more challenging than it already is.

I remember being in the same situation a number of years ago being employed for 12 hours a week and being put under pressure to make up my hours to 16 pw by the Job Centre. The job I was doing - admin for a charity - occupied a few hours a day over lunchtime and made getting another job very difficult as other employers were not happy with the hours I worked for the charity and couldn't give me appropriate shifts. In the end because I was living at home and contributing my minimum NI credits, I signed off completely and got on with the charity job for £400 a month. I ended up going off sick at the end of that year anyway, so possibly I could have found something else if I'd tried - but I don't think I had the stamina to do so.

Good luck, anyway. Hopefully your enterprise will take off and you won't have to make up the hours.

BigAunty

Just thought I'd revive this thread because there is a thread on the benefits forum which indicate that the HMRC are investigating ebay sellers to verify if they qualify for WTC. I expect they have random reviews of all self employed claimants anyhow.

In this particular instance, a disabled claimant sells vintage clothing and items on ebay who ran at a loss over the last year has been told by the HMRC that her activity is just a hobby, that she doesn't do the hours on it that she claims and has now received a demand to pay back the entire £6500 tax credits.

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4067609