Disbursements withheld - "not established in the UK for VAT purposes."
anyone else get the notice from Amazon today?
"We have received a notice from the UK tax authority, His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC), that they have determined that you are not established in the UK for VAT purposes. We must comply with HMRC’s indication, as the responsible tax authority, even though we previously confirmed your establishment in the UK, based on our assessment.
As a consequence, effective upon receiving this notice, the disbursements of part or all of your Amazon sales proceeds to UK customers have been temporarily withheld. Also, your Fulfilment by Amazon (FBA) inventory may be temporarily blocked from removal, unless the funds withheld exceed your estimated liability. Additionally, within 10 days, we will begin to collect and remit VAT taxes on your sales for goods delivered to UK customers."
I have no idea if HMRC have actually said this to Amazon or if its just a repeat of the situation earlier this year, I'm curious if anyone else has been affected by this again or just me?
I am and have always been a UK based business and always pay my tax obligations in full so I don't know where they've got the idea that I'm not.
Amazon throwing so many curveballs at me lately, between 'competitive pricing' policy and overcharging me FBA fees based on false measurements. Feels like they're squeezing everything out of us sellers, even more so than usual.
Disbursements withheld - "not established in the UK for VAT purposes."
anyone else get the notice from Amazon today?
"We have received a notice from the UK tax authority, His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC), that they have determined that you are not established in the UK for VAT purposes. We must comply with HMRC’s indication, as the responsible tax authority, even though we previously confirmed your establishment in the UK, based on our assessment.
As a consequence, effective upon receiving this notice, the disbursements of part or all of your Amazon sales proceeds to UK customers have been temporarily withheld. Also, your Fulfilment by Amazon (FBA) inventory may be temporarily blocked from removal, unless the funds withheld exceed your estimated liability. Additionally, within 10 days, we will begin to collect and remit VAT taxes on your sales for goods delivered to UK customers."
I have no idea if HMRC have actually said this to Amazon or if its just a repeat of the situation earlier this year, I'm curious if anyone else has been affected by this again or just me?
I am and have always been a UK based business and always pay my tax obligations in full so I don't know where they've got the idea that I'm not.
Amazon throwing so many curveballs at me lately, between 'competitive pricing' policy and overcharging me FBA fees based on false measurements. Feels like they're squeezing everything out of us sellers, even more so than usual.
16 replies
Seller_drRDxXcYTekDD
Update - Logged in today to see my account is back to normal and disbursements are available again.
All I did was email HMRC but received no reply, so I'm not sure what's actually happened here. Maybe a glitch or some kind of error? Either way, very concerning that we can have our livelihoods suspended for such an arbitrary reason.
Seller_76AUwmqvSyRIM
Could it have been a scam email? Was there any links of any kind in the email?
The wording doesn’t sound like Amazon-speak.
Seller_drRDxXcYTekDD
Definitely not, it appeared in my performance notifications and did actually have an effect on my account.
Also I spoke too soon on the above comment, my previous disbursement was cancelled and my funds are unavailable once again.
I received a performance notification last night stating I'm verified and my disbursements will be enabled again within 24 hours. Still no luck so I've just phoned Amazon and they've told me to wait another 24 hours and it should be working again.
I'm hopeful but you really never know when dealing with support. Fingers crossed this will be over soon.
Seller_9vdWGWz8QH0uZ
post. In the same situation since 22nd August 2024. Emailed HMRC, but no reply. Amazon still wants a letter from HMRC. And I have been told that HMRC are 70 days behind with the replies.
Seller_drRDxXcYTekDD
This really feels like a repeat of the verification issues earlier this year, I'm curious how many sellers are affected.
For the record, I haven't got an email reply from HMRC but the Amazon Account health team (on the phone) told me that I have actually been verified and HMRC reached out to them, but the issue still appears on my account health page.
Right now, my disbursements are still not working and the VAT is being taken out of each transaction on my account. I hope when this resolves, those charges will be reversed otherwise I'm gonna have a huge accounting headache on my hands.
In any case, Amazon needs to sort this ASAP. Arbirtrarily holding funds like this is just cruel and terrible for any business regardless of their cashflow situation.
Seller_drRDxXcYTekDD
Update 2: I got the performance notification again saying funds are eligible for disbursement, lasted a whole 48 hours and 2 disbursements later until they've disabled disbursements again and ask me again for proof of my establishment.
The verification to disbursement to verification loop continues...
I emailed HMRC at the email they provided but got no response so far, even 2 weeks later. So what I've done just now is contact HMRC to request a VAT 66 Certificate, it's basically the same as the one displayed on the HMRC website but a bit more official looking. Hopefully this should work as proof of establishment, though I'm beginning to wonder if that even matters? Clearly something is very broken in the Amazon system right now and sadly it's at my expense.
Support seem to just give me generic responses telling me to submit the documents when that's clearly not the issue, even the account health team on the phone have given me that same advice so apparently nobody knows what the hell is going on.
Seller_drRDxXcYTekDD
@Sarah_Amzn @Winston_Amazon @simon_amazon @sakura_amazon_ @julia_amzn
Ash_AMZ
Hello @Seller_drRDxXcYTekDD,
Ash here to assist. First of all, I would like to apologize for the delay on our response.
It has been understood that you need help with your funds disbursement.
I hope the review of your account has been completed, and funds has been released.
If you have any further questions, please don't hesitate to contact us on seller forums. The forums community and I, are here to assist with your concerns.
Regards,
Ash.
Seller_9vdWGWz8QH0uZ
We got the same message on the 21st of August. But still going through verification process.
Seller_drRDxXcYTekDD
FINAL UPDATE (HOPEFULLY)
I received a reply from HMRC today in the form of a letter (via email) which stated "We have accepted the information you have given us and have decided that you are established in the UK for VAT purposes."
After submitting this to Amazon through the account health page, they accepted the submission and informed me that they will recalculate any VAT they collected to send to HMRC between today and January 2021. Hopefully they will refund the VAT they have been collecting since August 22nd when I first got the performance notification.
The underlying issue was obviously legitimate and I'm glad it's over but the behaviour of Amazon support and the system has been bizarre with my disbursements turned on and off over 6 times in the last 2 weeks since I got the original notification.
I hope this thread can prove useful to anyone going through the same issue in the future.
