ATO targets eBay and Trading Post sellers

The Australian Taxation Office will launch a special crackdown on eBay sellers as it attempts to find tax dodgers who are under-reporting income or not reporting income from these sources.

The special crackdown, announced by Tax Commissioner Michael D’Ascenzo, will focus on individuals and businesses who have sold more than $20,000 worth of goods through online sales site eBay and Trading Post in any of the past three financial years.

The ATO plans to scan around 30,000 records from these sites as part of a data matching program aimed at catching those under-reporting income earned from online sales, or those who keep their online sales activity “off the books”.

“Records will be matched against different identifiers such as tax file numbers, ABN’s, addresses and date of births, which will improve the integrity of the data matching program,” D’Ascenzo said in a statement.

“When information obtained from data matching is used in an audit or review, the business or individual will be given the opportunity to confirm or contradict the information found from the data matching.”

The ATO has been trying to learn more about the online selling sector for the last few years as use of eBay and Trading Post has increased.

Back in 2008, the Tax Office targeted those who had sold more than $50,000 in either of the two preceding years. This latest crackdown will presumably catch a much larger number of users.

D’Ascenzo says any online sellers who know they have done the wrong thing can come forward voluntarily and access discounts of up to 80% on any penalties handed down by the ATO.