Ebay Secrets Blog

Internet Sales Tax & News for Diabetic Test Strips Sellers

August 3rd, 2010

eBay is working very hard to help stop the internet tax. Here is a message they sent out last week that everyone should read and respond to.

Internet Sales Tax

On July 1, a bill was introduced in the United States House of Representatives that would impose complex sales tax collecting requirements on internet retailers and entrepreneurs, including our eBay sellers. If passed, HR 5660, the so-called, “Main Street Fairness Act,” would require small online retailers to comply with varying and regularly changing sales tax rules and rates for thousands of tax jurisdictions, and to collect and remit sales taxes from each customer. This new sales tax scheme would be extremely burdensome and costly to small online retailers like you who have set up shop on the internet. A similar bill is expected to be introduced in the Senate as well. eBay is working very hard to stop this bill from becoming law, but we need your help.

Please join our effort to stop the passage of this anti-small business bill. In three minutes or less, you can sign this petition urging your lawmakers to protect small, online retailers by opposing new tax burdens.

Write Your Congressperson

Petitions are great, but nothing beats contacting your own congressperson.

If you know the name of your congressperson, just Google their name and you will get a link to their home page that has a form where you can email them and they also have fax numbers where you can fax them.

If you don’t know their name, go to the following link and type in your zip code

http://www.house.gov/zip/ZIP2Rep.html

Once you type in your zip code (don’t worry about the +4 you can leave it blank) you will go to a page with your congressperson’s name as a hyperlink. Just click on that link and you will be taken directly to your congressperson’s home page. Now just click on the contact link to send an email.

Be polite. The emails are read by staff and they just trash any weird or angry-sounding emails. The other ones get forwarded to the congressperson. Don’t bother your Senator with this as it hasn’t gone to the Senate yet.

News for Diabetic Test Strip Sellers

In my newsletter a few days ago I had a Musing’s item about problems with selling Diabetic Test Strips. And I warned that eBay was suspending sellers. Finally I have the real scoop:

It turns out that there have been some folks selling stolen strips and selling strips with Medicare or pharmacy prescription labels on them. The other trigger is sellin strips with short expiration dates. So follow these steps to stay out of trouble:

If you suddenly sell a large quantity of strips you could trigger eBay’s fraud detection. So if you have been selling small quantities and suddenly find yourself with a large supply just dribble them out slowly.
If someone calls you with a large supply of strips to sell –be careful. They may be stolen.
When buying strips be sure an check the expiration date. Make sure there is enough time to sell all the strips before the date expires.
Do not buy strips with Medicare labels. It is a crime to resell these.
If a box has a pharmacy label you can remove it with goo gone or lighter fluid before selling it.
Don’t buy or sell the Johnson & Johnson Brand as they will file a Vero complaint against you.

Follow these tips and you will be fine. If you have any other tips or questions please leave a comment so we can share this will all readers.

Skip McGrath

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eBay Business System – Learn How to Sell on eBay: The Complete eBay Marketing System by Skip McGrath

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