Society6 and accounting and tax treatment

Details

Society6 is one of the newer and more dynamic platforms for online business. It is primarily focused on artistic products, even slightly more artistic than similar platforms (Etsy)… Well, we won't be discussing art in this article, but we will cover various accounting aspects.

This platform operates on the principle of reselling - meaning the artists themselves enter into a business relationship with the American company Society6, LLC located at 1655 26th Street, Santa Monica CA, USA. Society6 effectively uses their "artworks" (designs, art, etc.) - in digital form - and then utilizes them in their products. Society6 generally creates, sells, and delivers the final products to customers. Therefore, in administrative terms, the artist isn't involved in the seller-buyer relationship. If this sounds too complex, perhaps start by reading the article "Society6 Offers an Interesting Business Opportunity for Artists."

So, the platform sells the products, and for most products, the artist is offered a 10% sales share, which means earning revenue from the sale of their services to a legal entity in a third country. Society6 thus sells these products on their behalf. The content of the sales is indeed digital products, which are by definition electronic services - but because it's a sale to a legal entity, a general rule applies instead of a specific rule (which is used for sales to end customers) - taxation is based on the recipient's location.

IMPORTANT:

Payment is done through PayPal, which has two key implications from an accounting-administrative perspective:

  1. Invoicing for sales generally doesn't require tax approval,
  2. Entrepreneurs need a PayPal account, preferably a business account - but this also means that transactions in this PayPal account should be treated as business events.

Doing business with PayPal is still one of the more widespread methods of payment services. Therefore, it's crucial that accountants handle this efficiently and focus more on professional aspects than manual data entry. You can read more about it HERE.

Online platforms are becoming an increasingly common way of doing business for entrepreneurs and providers from various industries. This offers excellent opportunities for many to present their work and practically offer it to the global market. However, administrative and accounting requirements should not be underestimated in this process.

 

Remember - Let digital become efficient. Your Digi-As :)

The development of DigiAce is co-financed by the Republic of Slovenia and the European Union from the European Regional Development Fund.

The development of DigiAce is co-financed by the Republic of Slovenia and the European Union from the European Regional Development Fund, with a financial support of EUR 54,000 under the P2 2022 call.
The aim of DigiAce is to automate the import of statements and transactions when dealing with FinTech providers. This promotes the transition to digital and more efficient business operations and encourages the recruitment of high value-added staff.
Short description of the results of the operation:
The operation has developed, refined and commercialised a web application for the conversion of business data through FinTech providers and its direct import into accounting and ERP software. In addition, we have developed and integrated the Bankconnect module, which allows a significantly simplified direct retrieval of bank statements also from traditional banks. Within the project, we have prepared the basics for building an API interface for more modern integration with other applications. In addition, the project implemented a number of other solutions, such as integration with the CRM system, integration with the payment and subscription system (Stripe) and a multilingual website - including a back-end multilingual interface (application).