Just saw this on an ebay listing.

“VAT WILL NOT APPLY
Winner to contact me ASAP before payment”

Presumably it’s just another attempt to get out of paying fees and if I were to win the auction (which I won’t now as I won’t bid) I’d be offered the “opportunity” to pay outside ebay and waive all my protection.

“VAT will not apply” on what? Somethings it should, some it shouldn’t.

As for contact me before payment they could have very legitimate reasons for asking you to do so, that said it might be a scam. They can’t force you to pay off ebay though and bidding is very low risk as they can’t force you to complete the transaction either.

See that on a lot of vans, if they’ve already had the VAT paid off.

Does seem like seller wants to get paid off the books though.

I should have said, this was on two listings from the same seller, for a front and rear mech taken off a new bike. VAT wouldn’t apply anyway.

I wonder what would happen if you paid and didn’t contact them. I guess they’d be annoyed and personally it’s not worth the hassle, but presumably there isn’t much they could do. I think I’ll just walk on by.

See that on a lot of vans, if they’ve already had the VAT paid off.

that’s not really how it works. It just means the seller isn’t vat registered. A vat registered business has to charge vat on anything they sell (excluding goods that vat doesn’t apply to) and a non vat registered seller can’t add vat to anything. So a perfectly good reason for not applying vat is…. the seller can’t apply vat.

Is the seller in the EU?

If so the VAT will be invoiced by the courier plus a handling fee.

UPS charge £12 or 5% whichever is highest IIRC.

Ah, good point. Maybe I was being too harsh on the seller. Postage is Royal Mail so I assumed the seller was in the UK, but actually they are in Jersey. Not sure how they avoid the VAT but it may all be above board.

Go outside eBay but use PayPal to retain buyer protection?

There is no VAT on Jersey.

Presumably that’s why.