Print on demand selling questions

Ponchos

Hi all,

I have a load of digital designs that I am looking to upload to a print on demand service and sell them on various items online. I have done a decent amount of research so far and think that using Printful for the orders, production and postage would be a good option for me, and then using Etsy as my shop but possibly also using Wix to create a website where items can be sold directly. Shopify might also be an option for this. Has anyone here done anything similar to this, and what is your experience with these platforms?

I’m also a bit confused as to what to do with regards to declaring tax/notifying HMRC and such things. I currently have a regular job working with an outdoor activity company and of course pay National Insurance and tax and such through this, so with this online venture how would this affect me regarding tax and whatnot? Most of the information I’ve found online about selling digitally is (understandably) about the selling aspect, I’ve found virtually nothing about declaring costs and taxation and whatnot other than “check the rules for your country”. Along with this, being that I am based in the UK but sales could be international, I assume I only need to be registered for tax in the UK?

Any help and information on these things would be much appreciated. Thanks in advance

Also if there is a better place to ask these questions please let me know.

El_Torro

You only declare your self employed income to HMRC if you make more than £1,000 a year. This can be done by self assessment. 

You won't be liable for income tax in another country just because you ship product from the UK to there. Your end customer will most likely have to pay VAT on the purchase though. This is best done by you, otherwise your customer may get a nasty bill with the delivery and might blame the hassle on you. 

DullGreyGuy

El_Torro said:

You only declare your self employed income to HMRC if you make more than £1,000 a year. This can be done by self assessment. 

For the avoidance of doubt "make" in the above comment means you have £1,000 of gross sales/revenue not profit. 

Ponchos said:
Along with this, being that I am based in the UK but sales could be international, I assume I only need to be registered for tax in the UK?

The world of tax is getting more complicated, historically you'd have been correct in that you only deal with UK taxes and your overseas importers are the ones that have to deal with local tax. Things have started to change though and now certain countries, including the UK, are expecting senders to collect their local tax on low value orders. 

I would check with Printful given they are the ones that are the deciding which of the 8 countries any given order will be printed and that will potentially influence any taxes due. They may well offer a solution where importation taxes are included.

Note that they do not have any UK print facilities so if import duties aren't dealt with by them then you will need to look into how to deal with orders under £135 being sent to the UK from Spain. 

Ponchos

DullGreyGuy said:

El_Torro said:

You only declare your self employed income to HMRC if you make more than £1,000 a year. This can be done by self assessment. 

For the avoidance of doubt "make" in the above comment means you have £1,000 of gross sales/revenue not profit. 

Ponchos said:
Along with this, being that I am based in the UK but sales could be international, I assume I only need to be registered for tax in the UK?

The world of tax is getting more complicated, historically you'd have been correct in that you only deal with UK taxes and your overseas importers are the ones that have to deal with local tax. Things have started to change though and now certain countries, including the UK, are expecting senders to collect their local tax on low value orders. 

I would check with Printful given they are the ones that are the deciding which of the 8 countries any given order will be printed and that will potentially influence any taxes due. They may well offer a solution where importation taxes are included.

Note that they do not have any UK print facilities so if import duties aren't dealt with by them then you will need to look into how to deal with orders under £135 being sent to the UK from Spain. 

This is where the confusion comes in! I myself am in the UK, Printful now has a printing/shipping centre in Birmingham so any sales withing the UK I asume would be more straightforward. But being online international companies, it could be that sales are handled by one of the USA printing sites and sent within the US, or somewhere else in the Americas, or something might be printed in UK/Latvia and sent to elsewhere in Europe. I also imagine that any tax is taken from the entire product, not just the profit i stand to make on it, so the tax needs to be worked into the overall sales prices to avoid either myself making no profit or the buyer being hit with an extra charge.

A lot of print on demand and sales sites (such as Etsy) make it all seem very quick and easy to just set up and sell but it seems tehre is very little information about the financial and taxation side of it all, and that is where things slow down. I'm sure there are people who just put items up for sale and wait for profits to come in, but I wouldn't want to risk being slapped with HMRC fines or whatever else, especially with the new laws/powers where they can see everything you've sold. It seems like things are getting more and more difficult.