Підсвіти ворога! Донать на відстежувальні комплекси 👉
Марія БровінськаThat's Life
8 April 2025, 16:49
2025-04-08
Tax officials say they don't "give OLX sellers a nightmare." Here are three cases that prove otherwise. Spoiler: if it weren't for the judges, sellers of feeders and key chains would already be paying fines
Imagine the picture: somewhere in the local tax authorities there are people who, having seen an unusual transaction by one of the card users, monitor websites selling goods such as OLX and identify so-called violator sellers there, record their ads and evidence of transactions, draw up administrative protocols in order to later issue a fine. This picture looks quite realistic. And, if it weren’t for the decisions of the courts, which do not see the screenshots of the fiscals provided as evidence, in fact, evidence, then the sellers from OLX had to pay a lot to the state treasury. dev.ua, despite the assurances of tax officials that sellers of personal goods are not being touched, found evidence of how they «give nightmares» to those who, selling goods for 100 or 50 UAH, are not registered entrepreneurs.
Imagine the picture: somewhere in the local tax authorities there are people who, having seen an unusual transaction by one of the card users, monitor websites selling goods such as OLX and identify so-called violator sellers there, record their ads and evidence of transactions, draw up administrative protocols in order to later issue a fine. This picture looks quite realistic. And, if it weren’t for the decisions of the courts, which do not see the screenshots of the fiscals provided as evidence, in fact, evidence, then the sellers from OLX had to pay a lot to the state treasury. dev.ua, despite the assurances of tax officials that sellers of personal goods are not being touched, found evidence of how they «give nightmares» to those who, selling goods for 100 or 50 UAH, are not registered entrepreneurs.
What happened
Yesterday, the media reported that tax officials had taken on sellers on OLX. However, tax officials deny that they are fining Ukrainians who sell things online. In reality, everything is a little different. dev.ua found at least three cases where the Tax Inspectorate came to sellers of penny goods. The sellers have not really paid the fines yet, because they appealed them in court. However, the fiscals tried to impose them.
We will remind you
The State Tax Service reported that they do not fine people for selling personal items on Internet platforms. «The information spread by a number of media outlets that the tax service has allegedly begun fining sellers from OLX, Promua, social networks and other platforms and automatically tracks all money transfers to individuals' accounts, even if they sell personal items online, is not true,» the report says.
The tax office emphasized:
the sale of personal belongings is not considered a basis for liability for violation of legal requirements;
only systematic sale and at the same time a homogeneous range of goods has signs of entrepreneurial activity. This does not apply to the sale of personal belongings by citizens using platforms such as OLX, Prom and any social networks;
Strengthening control over online sales is being carried out to prevent abuse and tax evasion in the business sector.
If you believe the information in the State Register of Court Decisions, things are not quite as they seem. We have collected three stories about how sellers of penny goods were checked by fiscal officials, and what the entrepreneurs received for their trade.
Case 1. Feeding bowl for 10 UAH
On April 3, a case was considered in Zaporizhia of a seller of a feeder worth UAH 10 on the OLX platform, who received funds to a PrivatBank card. The transaction took place in January.
Based on the tax information, an administrative protocol was drawn up against the seller (usually involving a fine). The court was provided with evidence in the form of screenshots from the OLX website, as well as correspondence between the buyer and the seller.
Screenshots from the OLX website indicate that the seller has more than 20 successful deliveries, and has 24 ads for the sale of goods on the website since October 2017, which indicates systematic activity in the sale of goods via the Internet. But the seller, who, according to tax authorities, is not registered as an individual entrepreneur.
The accused seller pleaded not guilty and explained that he was not engaged in entrepreneurial activity, selling personal used items on «OLX» that were no longer needed, items that did not fit or had been lying around for a long time and were not needed.
The court, having considered the arguments and evidence provided, concluded that the screenshots are not sufficient evidence that the seller systematically engages in entrepreneurial activity. «The screenshots available in the case materials are not proper and admissible evidence that the profile belongs to the person against whom the report was drawn up,» the court ruling states.
As a result, the court ruled that the seller’s actions did not constitute an administrative violation.
Case 2. Question price — 250 UAH
In March of this year, the capital’s tax authorities brought the administrative case of the seller on OLX to the Kyiv-Svyatoshynskyi District Court of Kyiv region, along with screenshots and receipts. The main claim of the tax authorities is that the seller does not have registration as a business entity. However, the court was not provided with any information from the Main Department of the State Tax Service in Kyiv region or the Unified State Register of Legal Entities, Individual Entrepreneurs and Public Organizations about the fact of the seller’s presence or absence of state registration as a business entity. Among the evidence are screenshots and a receipt for crediting UAH 250 to the seller’s card.
As in the previous case, the court sided with the seller, as it did not accept the fiscals' screenshots as evidence. The case was closed due to the lack of elements of an administrative offense.
Case 3. Keychains for 100 UAH and 10 ads for 4 years
On March 21, 2025, another case occurred in Zaporizhia. The Shevchenkivskyi District Court of the city considered the case of a seller of key chains worth 50-100 UAH, who was also not registered as an entrepreneur. Tax officials discovered the seller’s profile on OLX, which has more than 5 successful deliveries on the site since November 2021 and has 10 ads for the sale of goods.
And in this case, the court closed the case without seeing the elements of the offense.
Conclusion
From the above, it follows that tax officials have indeed taken on unregistered traders. However, there are currently no criteria for who should register and who should not, what the seller’s turnover should be for registering as an individual entrepreneur, and whether it makes sense to sell something for pennies without being under the microscope of tax officials.
Who can come to visit the State Tax Service? «If you sell things online more than 3 times a year, the tax service may be interested in you, because you are a systematic seller,» says Olga Vasilevska-Smaglyuk, a member of parliament from the Servant of the People party and deputy chairman of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Finance, Tax and Customs Policy. Systematic sellers are those who make a profit from selling goods or services in more than three episodes a year.
However, the tax service does not focus on such small cases.
According to Vasilevska-Smaglyuk, checking such episodes requires significant human resources from the tax authority, therefore it is not a subject of its global interest.
«Their global interest is focused only on those sellers who trade through online platforms and engage in e-commerce in large volumes — this is over a hundred transactions per month,» the deputy noted.
The Ministry of Finance is considering the option of taxing the activities of OnlyFans models, Glovo couriers, Bolt taxi drivers, Booking landlords, and all other users of digital platforms. How much will they have to pay?
Студенти-програмісти створили мережу фейкових онлайн-магазинів на OLX, Instagram та Facebook і ошукали десятки українців. Кожен отримав по 5 років (поки що умовно)
29 липня 2022 року Октябрський районний суд Полтави виніс вирок учасникам злочинного угруповання студентів-програмістів, які, заснувавши псевдомагазин електроніки в інтернеті, обдурювали покупців. Кожному з ділків суд призначив по 5 років тюрми. Поки що — умовно, з відстрочкою.
Росіяни продовжують шукати військових на Avito. В компанії заявили, що відокремляться від OLX Group і продовжать працювати як самостійний російський бізнес
Have important news to share? Message our Telegram bot
Key events and useful links in our Telegram channel
