In short: eBay pays out an amount in which sales, fees and refunds have already been netted. Book each sale at its gross amount as revenue against a dedicated eBay clearing account, the fees as an expense with input VAT, and the payout as a transfer to your bank. At month-end, the remaining balance of the clearing account has to be explainable.

That sounds simple, but in practice it often fails at one point: the fees appear both in the transaction data and on the monthly fee invoice. If you book both sources, the same costs end up in your accounts twice.

This guide is for commercial eBay sellers with a business in Germany who prepare their own data or hand it to an accountant. It covers the reports you need, a booking example and how to reconcile a month cleanly. It does not describe US or UK tax filing.

Which eBay reports do you need?

In Seller Hub, under "Payments" and "Reports" ("Zahlungen" and "Berichte" in the German interface), eBay provides the transaction report, the monthly statement and your invoices, among others. The transaction report lists the individual account movements. The monthly statement summarises a month and does not replace an invoice. The fee invoice documents the services charged and the applicable taxes. How the reports fit together is explained in eBay's help page on reconciling your sales transactions (in German).

For each month, also gather your sales documents and the actual bank receipts. Each source has its own job:

Source	Purpose in your workflow	Question to resolve
Sales document	Support the sale and its amounts	Has this sale already been recorded in the target system?
Transaction report	Match movements and references	Which lines belong to the same event?
Fee invoice	Support the expense and its tax treatment	Has another source already created this expense?
Monthly statement	Check monthly totals	Do the period and opening balance match?
Bank transaction	Confirm receipt of the payout	Has this transfer already been included?

This mapping matters most once several systems are involved. An invoicing tool may already have transferred the sales while a second application imports the payment data. Both supply useful information, but they must not create the same revenue independently of each other.

Is VAT charged on eBay fees?

For commercial sellers established in Germany, eBay has charged German VAT on its fees since 1 May 2018. According to eBay, the general rules for input VAT deduction apply, as with any other invoice from a business established in Germany (eBay help on VAT on eBay fees, in German).

If you are subject to standard VAT taxation, you can generally deduct the VAT shown as input VAT. Under the German small-business exemption you do not deduct input VAT; the fee is then recorded as an expense at its gross amount. What counts is always what your fee invoice shows.

Booking example: sale, fee, payout, refund

The following example assumes that you are established in Germany and subject to standard VAT taxation, sell domestically to consumers at 19% VAT, and that eBay charges the fee with German VAT. All amounts are chosen for the example. The account numbers come from the German standard charts of accounts SKR03 and SKR04 (status 30 June 2026, SKR03, SKR04, in German). Agree the accounts and tax codes set up in your books with your accountant.

A customer buys for €119.00 gross. eBay retains a fee of €10.00 net plus €1.90 VAT and pays €107.10 into your bank account.

Event	Debit	Credit	Amount
Sale	eBay clearing account	Revenue 19% VAT (SKR03 8400 / SKR04 4400)	€119.00
Fee, net	Sales commissions (SKR03 4760 / SKR04 6770)	eBay clearing account	€10.00
Input VAT on the fee	Deductible input VAT 19% (SKR03 1576 / SKR04 1406)	eBay clearing account	€1.90
Payout	Bank (SKR03 1200 / SKR04 1800)	eBay clearing account	€107.10

After that, the eBay clearing account is back at €0.00 for this transaction. The VAT of €19.00 arises from the sale price of €119.00; the lower payout does not change that. If your accountant works with automatic accounts in DATEV, the VAT is split out of the revenue account automatically. Agree the number of the eBay clearing account together.

If you later refund the full purchase price, you book the sales deduction against the clearing account:

Event	Debit	Credit	Amount
Refund to the customer	Sales deductions 19% VAT (SKR03 8720 / SKR04 4720)	eBay clearing account	€119.00

Whether and how much eBay credits back in fees for a refund is shown in the transaction report and on the fee invoice. Book any credit back against the fee account. Advertising fees can be recorded as advertising costs (SKR03 4600 / SKR04 6600) or together with the sales commissions. Settle the mapping once with your accountant and stick to it.

Choose one source that creates the fee expense

In the example, the fee expense comes from the individual transaction. The monthly invoice could just as well create the expense. For each fee, however, exactly one agreed route should trigger the entry.

Option 1: the invoice creates the expense. You record the fee invoice in your accounting software. The individual fee deductions from the transaction data then only serve to match and clear the clearing account.

Option 2: the transaction data creates the expense. Your import books the individual fees, as in the example above. You attach the monthly invoice as supporting evidence and compare its total with the fees already booked. It must not create the same expense again.

Which option fits depends on how your system handles documents and payments. The decisive question is: which source creates the entry, and which source supports it?

A document in your list of receipts does not tell you whether it has already created an expense. Check its booking status. The same applies to an imported fee deduction: only the entry itself shows whether it recorded a cost or just a payment movement.

How to spot duplicate fee expenses

Suppose your books already contain €300 of fee expense from individual transactions for one month. Later you record the invoice for exactly these services and book another €300 of expense. Now €600 sits in your costs, although the service was charged only once. A single matching payout in the bank does not prevent this duplicate.

To investigate a suspected duplicate:

Pick one fee invoice and note the invoice number and service period.
Find the related fee events in the transaction data.
Check whether both sources created entries on an expense account.
Compare services and references, not just amounts.
Document the overlap and have the entry corrected through your agreed correction process.

Matching totals are a clue, not proof. Different fees, later adjustments or a different period can add up to the same amount by chance. So do not simply delete the second file: the link between document, original entry and correction has to remain traceable.

Reconcile the month

Comparing a month's sales with its bank receipts alone is not enough. Amounts not yet paid out can come from the previous month or carry into the next one. For a simplified control month, assume the following movements; all values are chosen for the example:

Movement	Amount
Balance at the start of the month	€400.00
Customer payments received in the period	+€10,000.00
Refunds	−€800.00
Fee deductions	−€1,200.00
Amounts paid out to the bank	−€8,100.00
Calculated remaining balance	€300.00

The calculation is: 400 + 10,000 − 800 − 1,200 − 8,100 = €300. These €300 have to be explainable from the data, for example by amounts not yet paid out. A remaining balance is not automatically an error, but it must not disappear just because the month is being closed.

Also note which seller account, currency and period are included. Do not compare a payout from one account with sales from several accounts. For foreign currencies, you also need a traceable conversion.

Anything you cannot explain straight away goes on a list of open differences with reference, amount, affected sources, suspected cause and next step. Typical entries are:

Fee invoice available, related deductions not yet fully matched.
Fee deduction available, document missing.
Invoice and transaction import may have created the same expense.
Payout shown in the report, bank receipt only in the following month.
Refund available, link to the original order missing.

With a responsible person and a review date, each difference becomes a task that can be resolved.

How does the data get into DATEV, Lexware Office or sevdesk?

Before the first import, agree which data your accountant already has. Existing sales invoices, fee invoices and bank transactions matter as much as the newly prepared accounting data.

Test a closed month first, including opening and closing balances. Ask to be shown that each sale was recorded once as revenue and each fee once as an expense. Include a refund and a payout across the month-end in the test.

A DATEV batch that imports without technical errors does not yet confirm that the data is complete and correct. Check document references, document files, account assignments and open items separately. The same principle applies to Lexware Office or sevdesk: clarify the transfer route and the supported data types before you transfer the current month. What to look for when choosing a tool is covered in the guide on choosing e-commerce accounting software.

eBay accounting with KudTax

KudTax pulls orders, fees, refunds and payouts from eBay and does the reconciliation: each payout is matched, with AI assistance, to the sales, fees and refunds it contains, and anything that does not add up stays visible as an open difference. From the reconciled data, KudTax creates journal entries based on SKR03 or SKR04 and hands them over via DATEV export or to tools such as Lexware Office and sevdesk. Year-end closing and tax returns stay with you or your accountant. The eBay integration page shows how the connection works.

It is particularly useful if you chase recurring differences between data sources every month or run other channels alongside eBay. Even then, start with a limited period and use exactly the fee invoice and open cases that cause you work today.

KudTax is free for up to 25 orders a month, and larger plans can be tried free for one month: create an account. If you would rather discuss your eBay workflow first, book a demo.

Frequently asked questions

How do I book eBay fees?

Under standard VAT taxation, book the net amount as an expense, for example on sales commissions (SKR03 4760 / SKR04 6770), and the VAT shown as deductible input VAT. The other side goes to your eBay clearing account. Decide beforehand whether the expense comes from the transaction data or from the monthly invoice, so it is not booked twice.

Does eBay charge VAT on its fees?

Yes, for commercial sellers established in Germany, according to eBay since 1 May 2018. The general rules for input VAT deduction apply; under the small-business exemption, no input VAT is deducted.

Do I book fees from both the transaction report and the invoice?

Both sources may be needed for documentation. The same fee expense, however, may only be recorded once. Decide which source creates the expense entry and which serves as evidence and for clearing.

Does the eBay clearing account have to be zero at month-end?

Not necessarily. A remaining balance can be justified, for example by amounts not yet paid out. What matters is that it matches the open items. A forced zero does not replace reconciliation.

Can I use the account numbers from the example?

The numbers come from the standard charts of accounts SKR03 and SKR04. Whether they fit your setup, your tax codes and your transactions is something to agree with your accountant.

eBay Accounting: How to Book Payouts and Fees