Comments on: Round Up Your Financial Reports

By: mart8171

mart8171 — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 12:49:59 +0000

Don’t know if it helps, here’s eBay’s method of rounding (I just saw a link on eBay and remembered your question) :

In order to calculate fees as accurately as possible, eBay uses six digit net amounts. However, due to different VAT(Value Added Tax) rates within the European Union this may result in rounded amounts.

Example

Insertion fee for a French user on eBay Germany.

Gross amount on eBay.de: 0.40(incl. 16% VAT applicable in Germany)
Net amount: 0.344828
Gross amount France: 0.412414 (incl. 19.6% VAT applicable in France) = rounded amount of 0.41

In order to calculate fees as accurately as possible, eBay always uses six digit net amounts. At the time of invoicing the applicable VAT rate will be applied to these amounts.

This may result in rounding differences, as the 6 digit net amounts are used to calculate 2 digit invoice amounts. eBay rounds the gross amounts to 2 digit amounts, i.e. 0.412414 is rounded off to 0.41 and 0.4167 is rounded up to 0.42.

The invoice amount is calculated by adding up all the net amounts. VAT is then calculated based on the total of the net amount. In some instances this may create slight differences between gross and net amounts.

.
References :
http://pages.ebay.co.uk/help/account/vat-rounding.html

By: steve.hocking

steve.hocking — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 12:47:59 +0000

If the third decimal number is five or above, then it can be rounded up eg 34.875 … Consists of secondary EU legislation (Council Regulations 1466/97)

This may have been amended since 1997 though

Cheers

Steve
References :

By: charley160465

charley160465 — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 12:45:59 +0000

If you are paying them then you round up to the nearest 10 pence, if they are paying you…they round down to the nearest pound.

You find this happens mostly in your superminihyper market on the corner of the street!!!
References :

By: Lance R

Lance R — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 07:43:43 +0000

Are there EU regulations regarding decimal rounding for financial transactions?
How many decimal places are necessary when making calculations of financial data? Does the EU, or any other regulatory body, have regulations on this?

I am doing financial reporting regarding sales tax etc where the taxation figures end in a lot of decimal places. If I just round up to the nearest cent, there will be hundreds of euros difference at the end of the year. I am currently using 8 decimals which will avoid this problem, but I want to know if there are any official guidelines.