AndyMac1707817969

Ebay will pass your details to HMRC is you sell more than £1,500 or 30 items annually. HMRC have their own internal criteria as to whether they will investigate someone. They may ask you to provide additional information such as how much you paid for items. It does rely on honesty from the seller and if the amount of money HMRC thinks you are evading tax on whether it makes it worth their while opening a case. If they are not satisfied by your answers then that can result in an investigation. This normally means them going back 5 years, if they are not happy with that they can go back 20 years. Income is income whether it is earned though a business or as a private individual. If you do owe them money they you can either make a payment or they can deduct that amount from your income tax allowance and you get issues a new PAYE tax code (there is actually an option on a self-assessment tax return to do it this way). Of course you can get another member of your family on a lower income to sell it on your behalf if you don’t want to end up paying 40 / 45% on it.

With the huge labour issues in the UK if production was being moved back I would think Britain would be the last country anyone with half a wit would choose to locate a manufacturing business. Considering the latest figures show the percentage of the population of working age that is not working is now 21.9%. It even higher than this in the under 25s. Can’t see how this situation is going to be easily rectified with the ingrained ‘something for nothing’ culture that is endemic in this country.

Time for a few emails to abuse@cloudflare.com who seem to be hosting it. They have to respond to abuse reports so the more that report this the faster it will disappear (only to reappear elsewhere I am sure)

Anyone know anything about this rather generically named website? https://www.toytrainuk.com/contact-us/ Everything appears to be on sale at too reasonable a price, I can't find them listed as a stockist for Hornby, Bachmann, Accurascale etc and every picture is a stock image. The address 'Albion Way' appears to be a shopping centre in Norwich not where you would expect a model shop to be these days. The postcode NR6E 3UF on their site does not match the address given?

Gaugemaster were doing them for £194.95 with free postage

The 'section 75' protection provided by using a credit card is by far superior to anything any third party company offers. Section 75 protection is 'ridiculously good' and is backed by the law and lasts for a period of 18 months after purchase. The protection offered by companies such as PayPal lasts usually between 30 to 90 days, is not enforceable by law and is based purely on 'company policy', you should read this policy as often where there is ambiguity for things such as ‘not as described’. When you use a company such as PayPal then you are using an intermediary. If Hornby were to go bust then your credit card payment is to PayPal not to Hornby so you may well just have nullified any protection you might have had by using it to fund the transaction. Retailers prefer not to use PayPal as the fees are high and if buyer payment is sourced from a credit card then the retailer ends up with even higher fees. Generally nowadays unless it’s a doggy site, the days of supplying card details for the retailer to put trough as a 'customer not present' transaction are long gone. Whenever you make a payment on a site, the details are automatically passed through to the card processing portal and the retailer sees none of them. They either take payment or get an authorisation. If the payment is not rejected outright then the retailer is given a risk score as to how safe the payment is, basically the likelihood of a chargeback. This will depend on things like Multi Factor Authentication having been used in the payment process. It’s up to them then to proceed or not to proceed with the sale, they risk losing the money and the goods. Most transactions are done now by obtaining an authorisation so payment is not taken until goods are ready to be dispatched. Retailers storing card information is a really bad idea for them is they don’t have the security to protect it which their liability insurance would have to cover if security is breached. Provided they have the necessary security retailers can store the card details but never the CV3 number. If a data breach occurs and you were found to have stored then CV3 then you will end up with a substantial fine from people like VISA.

Never bought anything from them as I never knew they even existed

At the moment there is just more supply than demand, unfortunately for those with the highest fixed overheads such as premises and wages they will be the least resilient. Hattons may well have seen no way to trade out of the position they are in and instead of running up huge debts often having to secured by personal guarantees from the directors as banks will often not lend or extend overdrafts to limited companies due to their limited liability, they have to be sure they can get their money back. Smaller business can generally weather it longer but it all comes down to how long the downturn lasts. On a positive it means the cake will be sliced between less retailers, this also means less competition or smaller retailers who have had to compete with those such as Hattons may well now be able to work with a higher margin. This means however that with less competition you may not get as many bargains. As with most things in life what is good for one party is bad for the other and vice versa. Sales are not always a good thing, short term gain for the customer, long term problem for the hobby. Supporting your local model shop does not mean buying items at a price from which the retailer can hardly make a living. Few people nowadays however seem to care.

Ok so Hornby should produce a 2024 catalogue and only have items in it that are available on the shelves when it goes to print in 2023. What would the point of the catalogue be? Why don’t you just not buy a catalogue and just look at what is ‘in stock’ in any of the online retailers. You can then remain oblivious to the planned relaeses and let other buy the catalogue who are interested in what Hornby have planned. Hornby don't manufacture anything themselves so they are at the mercy of third part suppliers and as in any business things don't always go to plan. Sometimes circumstances change, dates change or something has to be cancelled, that is life. Hornby have to adapt to this, it's a necessary part of business. Not everything can be set in stone Afraid we have been here about 50 times before with people thinking Hornby should pander to ever one of their whims.

I sell a lot of model railway online (just as a hobby and to fund my new purchases as I have discovered a liking for Gauge 1) and sales have only been about half their usual amount since about July 2023. In the month of December I sold twice as much as I usually did in the same month in previous years and they are mainly from regular customers. During the pandemic sales went through the roof. It has now gone a bit quite again but still sales are coming in. I don’t think over the space of 6 months half the model railway enthusiasts have suddenly kicked the bucket, most people I sell too and the chats I have with them are of a working age, mainly in their 50s but there are younger ones. They are the ones with money and those in their 70s etc are the least likely to be spending significant amounts of money, most retailers are not going to miss those who think spending £5 here and there is too much. Just gone quite as so called public services such as the BBC have convinced many people there is a cost of living crisis. Don't want to sell too much anyway nowadays as along with this and my day job I refuse to pay the top rate of tax when you can't even get a GP appointment. It was fine 20 years ago for model railway shows such as Warley to be the showroom for suppliers to advertise and launch new items. With the Internet they no longer need this type of event or the costs involved, a YouTube video is a lot more cost effective and reaches a much bigger audience. Model railways have been my hobby for over 50 years but I have never joined a club and have attended few exhibitions. Warley has taken quite a log of abuse over the years, expensive and not worth going to was quite often banded about. At the end of the day I can view layouts on YouTube and the only think I really miss out on is the Warley wagon which I can buy on eBay if I really wanted for twice the price but still cheaper than the petrol money.

Last month many places had the TfW coaches heavily discounted. Maybe it’s not a popular livery and Hornby now assume the Class 67 will not be either.

I don't think the solution to anything is cheap plastic stations. With fixed costs being the same for low and high value items, cheap anything just means you have to sell a lot more to make the same amount of money. Hattons most likely choose to move to Widness as like other large retailers like Rails of Sheffield they have a separate warehouse for online stuff it’s not stored at their shop. Running 2 premises when 90% or more of your business goes though one especially when running costs of a warehouse are a lot less expensive than a high street shop. This will have come down to a simple lack of sales and not warning to run up huge debts trying to trade through something that has no end in sight. Sales took a drastic downturn in the summer of 2023 and apart from Christmas there is little sign of them recovering. Businesses often fold in the New Year having hoped that Christmas may have seen a change in their fortunes. As with trains, buses and shops, people don't use them when they are there and then lament them when they disappear. I would see Accurascale take on the Genesis Coaches and produce another run of them as they can sell the Irish ones under their Irish railway Models brand.

Doubt it was Hornby's fault for killing them off. With just about every model shop struggling with big discounted sales much more likely to be the customers of lack of them. Seen many places with sales with discounts where items would have been snapped up even this time last year and nothing is shifting. Several shops selling MK4 and MK3 coaches for less than £25 and they still have plenty in stock. Doubt Hattons will be the last, just depends on how long this goes on for.

Don't ever remember any class 60 ever coming with the snowploughs / obstacle deflectors you are describing. Can't find a single image with any fitted. Does not look like R30027 does either.

Repairing might be cheaper than buying a brand new loco but it’s not hard to pick up a second-hand Mallard for less than £100, for Margate made ones, less than £50. I just buy either the part of a spares / repairs model from eBay, remove the bit I need and then sell the remainder on, quite often for more than I paid for it originally.

What size of market is there now for spares especially for locos decades old? Unlike previous generations may people lack the skills to diagnose faults and repair locos. Simple cost of labour nowadays makes having a loco repaired uneconomical if it’s going to take several hours of work (as it does for most things). It might be viable to have additional parts made as spares when items are first produced but to expect Hornby to bear the high cost to commission a third party to manufacture new spares on demand for models years old is quite unrealistic just to satisfy a handful of people. Exactly how many of a particular spare for a 35 year old model would you expect Hornby to actually sell? Set up a whole production run to knock out 30 or 40 of a particular spare part. Guess it might work if you were ready to pay several hundred pounds an item I think yet again this is people looking at something only from their own point of view and failing to realise from a business point of view it’s a non-starter. Even if these were produced the cost of producing them would only bring howls of indignation. For you it might be a hobby but for Hornby it’s a business and if there is absolutely no business reason to do it them they should not.

As far as I am aware only the new units produced starting in 2023 have motorized fans. These are the ones with pre-fitted speakers and the coupling attached to the chassis and not the bogie. R30077 the Midland Pullman definitely does. Prior to this a few HST produced about 12 years ago had working fans driven via a friction coupling to the motor flywheel, R2949 the Arriva XC definitely did. They were not a great success and should really be avoided most people I think removed the little bit of rubber sleeving that drove the fan by resting against the flywheel. The main issues with these They greatly affected the performance of the loco and it ran like a dogOnly the power car had a working fan the dummy did notThe speed of the fan was determined by the speed of the motor so when the loco stopped the fan stopped

How it works is simple, HMRC get sales figures from Ebay, Facebook Marketplace and just about every other major online site where you can sell items. No human is involved, if the figures in their database for you exceed a certain threshold and they have no tax return declaring it then a letter is automatically generated and sent to you basically informing you they have information that shows you have been receiving an income via an online marketplace. It gives you 2 options, option 1 make a declaration that you have not been receiving an income or option 2 give you an opportunity to make a declaration as to how much you think you owe in unpaid tax and make you tax affairs compliant. They are simply giving you enough rope to hang yourself considering they already have the answer. There is no removing and adding money, tax year ends on the 5 April every year, you then have until 31st January the following year to submit a self-assessment and pay the tax due. HMRC do a random check on returns and if they significantly disagree as to what they think these might be then they will inform you they are opening a non-compliance case against you and you need to submit the information you used to calculate your return. They can go back 5 years and if they feel you are not giving them full disclosure 20 years. eBay hold records going back to the first thing you ever bought and sold with them, you can request all this through ‘My eBay’, it takes a couple of days, if you can get it HMRC can get it. You end up having to pay the back taxes, interest on the amount owed and a fine for every year each tax return is late. Of course if you are also claiming benefits from DWP and have made a declaration to them that have no income so that is an additional whole new world of trouble. Unlike other businesses where they can only make an educated guess as to whether you are being honest they really have the answer in front of them , they don’t need to get access to you bank accounts (at this point) through that an come later. Knew someone once who decided it was a good idea to fiddle their electricity. It was a complete success until the meter reading came along and an investigation launched as to why his house used only 10% of the electricity that the average house in the same street used.

eBay have been supplying HMRC sales information for years. Around January last year a large number of what are referred to as 'nudge letters' went sent out on-mass to many eBay sellers advising them to get their tax affairs in order. It’s really just a case if you are selling a lot (I think HMRC only allow something silly about £1,000 a year for a hobby). After that you have to obtain a UTR number from them and then fill in a self-assessment yearly. Problem really comes in proving the purchase price in order to determine profit if any. Of course if you sell more than about £80K a year you have to be registered for VAT which is just a huge complication if you don’t have VAT invoices for things you might have purchased. If you are liquidating your own assets then you may have to prove you are not making money on said items, it’s up to you to prove this HMRC generally don't take people's word for these things. Of course the idea that these rules are not designed for people like me does not cut much ice with them either. You quickly find the rules apply equally to everyone irrespective of how special a case people think they are.

It is the sellers to sell and they can ask what they want for something. They will try and get a as much as they can, same as anyone else. Don't see anyone selling their house for example for any less than the max they can get for it. As most buyers seem to want get something for as little as they can irrespective if someone is able to make a living from it I don’t see how buyers can claim any moral high ground. Mistakenly advertised items for sale and got the decimal point in the wrong place. The buyers indignation that they aren’t getting a £150 loco for the £15 they thought they were. A simple and obvious mistake but oh no apparently it’s their right to have it for the advertised price, absolute rubbish. I generally find when it comes to money very few people’s principles ever extend far past their wallets whether they are sellers or buyers.

If the new T1 was to make an attempt I believe the plan is to use the 'Facility for Accelerated Service Testing' in Pueblo Colorado https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transportation_Technology_Center

If the Pennsylvania Railroad T1 Steam Locomotive Trust realise their ambition when their new T1 is completed then there is a possibility Mallard will lose the record. Not sure what conditions the record has to be done under, does light engine count (who makes up the rules). Might be difficult finding rolling stock for such an attempt to pull. There is also the wisdom of building such a loco and then potentially wrecking it or at least never being quote right after making such a record attempt.

Where would you be placing a signal box where 10mm either way would cause an issue with space. By their nature they are usually located with lots of space around them to give the signal men a clear view of the track.

Unless you are going to renumber and re-letter the coaches, Hornby's last offering of MK3 coaches in BR swallow livery only provided for one option, coaches lettered from A to H, see below. I don't think any previous sets of Mk3s in this livery had enough unique numbered coaches to even form an 8 car set, they just had one first (R4853), one TSO (R4854), one buffet (R4851) and one TGS (R4852) Hornby R40005 BR Mk3 Trailer Guard Standard Coach A 44055 Hornby R40003C Mk3 TS trailer Standard Open Coach B 42103 Hornby R40003B BR Mk3 Trailer Standard Open Coach C 42167 Hornby R40003A BR Mk3 Trailer Standard Open,Coach D 42168 Hornby R40003 BR Mk3 Trailer Standard Open, Coach E, 42169 Hornby R40004 BR Mk3 Trailer Buffet Coach F 40703 Hornby R40002A BR Mk3 Trailer First Open, Coach G, 41086 Hornby R40002 BR Mk3 Trailer First Open, Coach H, 41085

There are many factors than can delay a loco, yes there can be production issues, Hornby don't make anything themselves anymore so they are no longer masters of their own destiny when it comes to production. There are also other reasons, you have to have a market to sell to and just because you have ordered one will not be the main deciding factor. Once you produce an item you have a large amount of money tied up in stock which you then have to sell and turn back into cash as quickly as possible. At the moment, just in case it had somehow passed you by, the retail market is very depressed, the worst I have seen it in years. For a business no sales means stock sits in the stock room unsold. Unsold stock means no money to buy new stock from Hornby or anyone else. It would be pretty dumb of Hornby to produce items they cannot sell on to retailers so it may well be a case Hornby have purposely pushed back production until retailers are in a position to place orders for it. I must admit I am perplexed as to why Hornby did another run of the APT (though that was pushed back a year) and a second run of the blue coronation coaches when some retailer still have stock of the first batch. Clearly there is a lot more stock than there is people to buy it. Whatever you decide to do with your stuff I doubt anyone at Hornby will be sticking their head in the oven over it.