Collection of stick tops up for auction tomorrow

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Member for

14 years 2 months

Posts: 635

Thankyou for the heads up Tony and very interesting. Reading the small print am I right in thinking there is a 5% charge for the buyer on the final fee and an additional 20% VAT. Therefore whatever the winning total amout is there is a further 25% to pay?

Member for

19 years 5 months

Posts: 9,821

Based on my (possibly faulty) understanding of UK laws, if you are out of the country and have it delivered to you, you should not have to pay VAT.

Member for

14 years 2 months

Posts: 635

Thanks for that I must of missed the ‘18.5% premium’ charge. Therefore I take it that you pay around 43.5% in various charges and taxes on top of winning price!

Member for

16 years 7 months

Posts: 5,927

Unless the seller is registered for VAT, you won't pay that in addition to the hammer price and there's no mention of this seller (I haven't looked at all the hyperlinks but I'm assuming that all items are from the same seller as for the first listing) being VAT registered. However as the auctioneer is registered for VAT, you will pay that on its commission. Thus according to the website you'll pay 28.2% in addition to the hammer price by way of the VAT inclusive buyer's commission. So if you bid £100 for a control column and that's the highest bid, you'll have to stump up £128.20 before you get it. And when you add that to what, presumably, the seller will have to pay by way of commission (incuding VAT), you'll see why auctioneeers are the only guaranteed winners when items are sold and bought through this medium!