What eCommerce Regulations are there when selling in the UK?
-
I was informed last night that in a month from now one of my clients is launching some campaigns with a daily deal partner in the UK (Great Britain & New Zealand). (Yes, first time I'd heard of it) Regardless of the timeline, our team is now tasked with making sure we have their site ready for selling in the UK. I just want to make sure we're crossing all our T's and dotting the I's. (We're based in the U.S. and selling all physical products, no digital)
A couple questions came to mind:
- Are we required to display the product prices in the local currency? - I thought this was kind of silly, but the daily deal partner thought this was required.
- VAT - Is it seriously 20% in United Kingdom? And is that flat across the whole area? Would make it a lot easier than the US with 1,000's of different tax rates.
- Any other rules or regulations that come to mind would be greatly appreciated
Thanks in advance for your response!
Have a great day,
Kevin
-
Good info. Thank you!
-
Hi Kevin
Yes the UK has quite a few laws regarding business websites and especially ecommerce sites. Besides what some have advised above you will also have to put an address of a physical location on the website. It is the law that all UK companies and those that trade here disclose their contact details on their website.
-
No problem, glad to help.
With the p
-
Hi Steve,
Thank you for explaining some of the nuances with VAT. We don't seem to sell any of the products in the reduced or zero rate VAT categories.
The postage was also new to me so thank you for bringing that to my attention.
-
Hi Moose,
I really appreciate your reply!
-
Thanks for your response. It was very helpful!
-
Regarding VAT the previous responders are slightyl wrong (sorry).
There are actually 3 rates of VAT in the UK - standard (20%), reduced (5%) and zero rated (0%). It depends what you are selling as to what VAT rate you should apply. The majority of items are 20% but there are some which are lower.
If you are wondering how I know this, our products have a mixture of all three.
Also you need to remember postage as you have to charge or include VAT on your delivery costs at whatever rate the goods are you are sending. So if your goods are 20% then VAT on your postage is also 20%, if it is 5% then delivery is also 5%. However if it is a mix it gets complicated.
As previously mentioned you need to look into the Distance Selling Regulations and to be honest if I saw an item on a site in the UK that wasn't in GBP then there is no way I would buy it.
-
You need to comply with UK consumer law - the main laws which apply are the Sale of Goods Act and Distance Selling Regulations. This page has links to guidance on both issues http://www.tradingstandards.gov.uk/advice/advice-business.cfm
Local Trading Standards offices, who deal with customer complaints in their areas, can be very helpful in making sure your Terms & Conditions comply with UK law. As our business developed we liaised with our local Trading Standards team on these issues, but I'm not sure who you would deal with if you don't have a UK office.
VAT is at a flat rate with the exception of some offshore areas where there is no VAT, and a lower rate applies to certain products/situations. I'm no expert on this but some of our customers have mentioned lower VAT on heating appliances for newbuild properties. You're best off going direct to the UK tax office for information on VAT - http://www.uk-tax-office.co.uk/
Also the European law on cookies is just coming into force, so you need to make sure you're okay on this front as well http://www.ico.gov.uk/for_organisations/privacy_and_electronic_communications/the_guide/cookies.aspx
-
Kevin, I have previously worked for an agency that has many clients from UK and most of them are related to eCommerce so I have quite a good idea about it!
On-line buyers in UK are a bit different from the buyers in USA; they are more local orientated so if you are not mentioning the price in GBP you should!
About VAT, it was 17% quite a while back but I checked one of the sites has worked on and it says 20% now so, yes on that too!
Thing that you should consider if you are targeting the UK market are:
- You should have a clear Return Policies
- They Love Privacy Policies and Terms and Condition page and I have actually noticed people reading that!
- Details about the product on detail page.
All in all give them less area to ask question from you and provide them enough information to make a decision!
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
International website sharing with .com/.au/.uk
I have a small business in the United States and would like to copy our main website for my international partners. My website is a .com. I think that their domains will end in their country codes: .au and .uk. We are open to using different domains. We plan to share blog articles and other content, but do not wish to be penalized for duplication. I have tried to read articles on this topic, but am unfamiliar with a lot of the terms. Is there any way to do this simply? Many thanks, Steph
International SEO | | essential_steph0 -
Linking .com and .co.uk
My client has an online ecommerce store which he is due to launch later this week. He owns both the .co.uk and the .com - the site is hosted on .co.uk and the .com domain redirects to the .co.uk The client wants anyone who visits the site from the .com to see permalinks when later going through the site as .com as opposed to .co.uk permalinks. Is this possible/any suggestions? Thank you!
International SEO | | jamiericey0 -
Wordpress SEO/ Ecommerce , Site with Multiple Domains ( International ) & Canonical URLs
Hi I have an ecommerce site with an integrated wordpress instance. I want to have one wordpress site that outputs to 2 domains exactly the same content , but one will have canonical URL . NZ & Australia Sites. So: Would I use the rel="Alternate" hreflang="en-nz" . I want the same content to rank well for each country and not be penalised for duplicate content. Ideas?
International SEO | | s_EOgi_Bear0 -
.com AND .co.uk.
Many of the massive sites (like Amazon) are using both .com and .co.uk. For smaller sites, is this a good way to rank highly on Google.com and .co.uk? Is there a way to do this without duplicating content or diluting link juice?
International SEO | | ojwilliams80 -
International Hub site: .uk vs domain vs subdomain
Financial company with 2 sites: 1- Mybrand.com for the US market.
International SEO | | FXDD
2- global.mybrand.com is the hub for international with selection for 10 languages: drop-down allows selecting between mybrand.jp, mybrand.fr, etc Now we have the opportunity to redesign the site from zero and I am exploring to get rid of the subdomain for the global site What would be your preference to use as the international hub? a) mybrand.co.uk: I have to use lawyers to get the URL from squatter b) mybrandGlobal.com : URL easy to get, and can be geo targeted using google webmaster tools. Cons: It might not rank as well as .co.uk in the UK, which is our biggest market c) global.mybrand.com-- pros: keep using it because it is aged and has some authority. Google might now see subdomains as part of TLD, thus making it a valid way to separate international from US .. Cons: SEO best practices advice to avoid subdomains because it might not pass full link value across domains. There is not really different content the subdomain, it is just the hub for international Thanks in advance for the help0 -
UK based people Need your help
I'm aware that this is not SEO related, but bare with me: Launching a new business venture and need some advise. the site will be located in the UK (for legal reasons) and since I have no experience with UK webhosts. I kinda need your help on selecting a good webhost. Money is not importants but what is: - excellent up times unlimited bandwidth So if you could share your experiences it would be much appreciated. thx in advance 🙂
International SEO | | ReneReinholdt0 -
Ranking well in Google US but not showing up in UK
Hi, We are trying to position a specific site for a big sport event that will be played at the end of May. We only care about Google UK. It had no relevant content until last week. The site is a almost a year old but we just started to get links for it (all from the UK). They worked so fast: we were in page 2 of SERPs in the UK within a few days. But suddenly the site has disappeared and we're not even in top 100 anymore. However, we are ranking extremely well in the US (first page for the keywords we wanted to rank for). The site is a .com and it's hosted in Wordpress.com (with a custom URL). I understand that that can be a problem, but we have already told Google that our business is in the UK through Webmaster Tools. I guess that with time and more UK links, Google would ultimately understand that our focus is the UK audience, but unfortunately we have no time and we can't wait due to the date of the sport event. What do you think that we can do to rank well in the UK and not in the US as fast as possible? Thanks!
International SEO | | jorgediaz0