Forum

Re: German Stealth VAT ID + Docs - or other country?
 

Thats ok, I start all my accounts without SCHUFA and get 500 or 1k items without problems, not sure about your creation methods. Also I haven't been asked yet to provide them with documents. :thumb:

Not sure what it'll be in the future with Ayden instead of pp.

One question tho: how do you deal with the VAT certificate?

Cheers

Re: German Stealth VAT ID + Docs - or other country?
 

How are your listing habits, do you start with low volume/low risk in the first month(s) ?
Documents should come when you reached incoming transfers to the EU AML Limit of 2500€ in your Paypal account :)

I did not yet need any VAT docs/IDs. so far my accounts are at around 12k total turnover each, so it could still be needed at 17.5k, which is DE yearly limit between small business (no VAT) and regular VAT.

Re: German Stealth VAT ID + Docs - or other country?
 

Not really sure about that. As I heard the Finanzamt will issue these docs to "Kleinunternehmer" who ware not VAT registered as well. But not sure about that.

Re: German Stealth VAT ID + Docs - or other country?
 

I am not completely sure when and who needs any VAT docs when selling on .de

What I read in Update April 2019:

In practice, the following three situations will normally trigger mandatory VAT registration:

1. If you are an EU established seller and your business is trading over the legal thresholds defined by your home country you must ensure that you are registered for VAT. The thresholds vary between EU countries and are currently anything from 0 EUR in Spain to 85,000 GBP in UK. In practice, this means that you must register for VAT immediately if you are a Spanish business (no minimum threshold), whereas you are required to register for VAT as an UK seller only after you have made over 85,000 GBP sales within 12 consecutive months.

2. If you are selling goods that are warehoused/pre-deployed in any other country than your home country, then you must register for VAT immediately in the EU country where your goods are located. There is no minimal threshold and this rule also applies for sellers from outside of the EU with inventory pre-deployed in the EU.

3. If you sell a lot of goods located in one EU country to private buyers in another EU country (distance selling), you may also be required to register for and collect VAT in the country of your buyer if you exceed specific thresholds for that country. These range from 26,135 EUR for distance sales to Romania to 100,000 EUR for Germany.


WARNING EBAY LINK

https://www.ebay.com/help/selling/se...ons-eu?id=4650

What should I do in case that I am not living in Germany and selling from other EU country ?

Thanks in advance!

Re: German Stealth VAT ID + Docs - or other country?
 

That's how I understand things:

1. If you are a seller registered in Germany and selling in Germany you're **** out of luck from 1st October onward. You need the doc.

One exception might be small business owners. But from what I heard even if you are a small business that is not liable for VAT you'll get a document from the revenue department confirming so and you'll have to submit the doc.

2. If you're a seller registered from abroad, weather EU or not, and do not have an interim storage in Germany and your yearly turnover is smaller than 100k Euros there's no VAT liability for you in Germany. Thus no registration needed.

Correct me if I'm wrong.

Re: German Stealth VAT ID + Docs - or other country?
 

I thought the same. Let's just wait and see what happens.

Re: German Stealth VAT ID + Docs - or other country?
 

My first post here and read this thread with interest also want to say thank you for all the great information here. I think though there are some misunderstandings.
In Germany if you are going to create a business account, you will need a Gewerbeschein, (commercial/trading license) which means you have to have an address in Germany. Through the application for a Gewerbeschein, your details are forwarded to the Finanzamt (Tax office) who then issue you with a VAT number. To register as a commercial seller you need this number. Also if you sell through EBAY you have to supply a Bescheinigung über die Erfassung als Steuerpflichtig, which you get from the Tax office. Without this you cannot sell commercially on Ebay if you are in Germany. As someone above pointed out.
Obviously you can sell from an outside country but you will not be competitive when it comes to post/Versand, which plays a big role with german consumers.
The biggest danger with selling on EBAY commercially or private are the Abmahnanwälte Lawyers who send out cautions with costs attached. they will pick up on any legal failure you make and are like sharks. Best to have everything legally checked in advance, cheaper in the long run. Also if you exaggerate as a private seller, they will pounce on you, claiming you are a business and demand costs etc.

Schufa is not necessary, Schufa checks if you are credit worthy, banks and businessesuse this to check before giving credit/sendig goods. If you are schufa negative you will not be able to open a bank account or a paypal account. You cannot influence Schufa in any way.

The biggest problem with a stealth account is the VAT number and the Bescheinigung, you have to give the Vat number when applying and you must give the proper name otherwise the VAT number will not be accepted.

What would interest me, are these stealth accounts private, when yes then one is severly limited in the quantity of goods which one can sell.
Creating multiple businesses with different trading licences would be very expensive from the accounting side.

I have been suspended from EBAY but am interested from time to time in selling stuff.
The information on stealth accounts in Germany are all a bit vague. The two big problems are VAT and Abmahnanwälte. Would be grateful to hear if anyone has solutions to bypass this.