Second-hand, consignment and refurbished: a catalogue that turns over daily
A second-hand store behaves nothing like a store selling new goods: each listing describes one object, disappears once sold, and leaves behind a page that has to be closed properly. Add a specific tax regime, consignor bookkeeping, and a listing cost that decides whether the business is viable.
One item, one listing, one sale
The catalogue is made entirely of one-off pieces that stop existing once bought. The consequences are immediate. The site map changes every day, which rules out treating sitemap generation as a monthly job. Hundreds of pages have to be closed correctly every week: a genuinely deleted page is not a page redirected anywhere convenient, and redirecting an entire sold-out stock to the home page merely moves the problem. Categories, finally, empty out without warning and end up displayed with not a single item.
What needs deciding upfront is the rule: what becomes of a sold listing. Keeping it online marked as sold is worth it when the object is sought after and serves as a price reference. Redirecting to a category makes sense when equivalents exist. Closing it outright is right when nothing replaces the object. All three outcomes have to be automated, otherwise nobody applies them.
Margin scheme VAT, the costliest mistake
Second-hand goods fall under a scheme where tax applies to the difference between selling price and purchase price, and where the invoice given to the buyer shows no VAT. The native calculation in all three main CMS platforms, however, applies a rate to the selling price and itemises that amount on the document. Left alone, the invoice issued is wrong — and wrong across every affected sale.
The work involves holding the acquisition price on the listing in a non-public field, computing the margin at order time, producing a compliant document carrying the mention of the scheme applied, and separating margin-scheme sales from normally taxed sales in the accounting reports — because a store often mixes both, especially when it also sells new accessories.
Other needs specific to the field
- The consignor: knowing where each piece came from, which commission applies, what to pay back after the sale, and which unsold items to return by which date. It is a parallel ledger alongside the store, with its own statements.
- A standardised, filterable condition grade — as new, very good, good — that a buyer finds worded identically from one listing to the next.
- Faults photographed and described item by item: the precision of that description decides how a dispute ends, so it has to be structured rather than left to free text.
- A contained listing cost: photographing, describing, weighing, pricing and publishing an object must fit into a few minutes, or the time spent exceeds the margin.
- For luxury and refurbished goods: serial number, certificate of authenticity, service or refurbishment history, and battery health for devices.
- Additional fields that survive an export and a re-import, otherwise any data migration wipes half the value of the catalogue.
Useful pages on these points
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Incorrect tax on prices
The classic symptom when the calculation applied does not match the actual tax regime of the business.
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301 redirect
Unavoidable when hundreds of listings leave the catalogue every week.
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Stock management
On a catalogue made entirely of single units, the slightest delay in decrementing becomes visible.
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Custom development
A fast listing back office and consignor management are development work, not settings.
Frequently asked questions
What should happen to listings for items already sold?
Do CMS platforms handle margin scheme VAT natively?
How can consignors be managed without separate software?
Condition grade or free description?
How do you cut the time it takes to list an item?
Do custom fields survive an export and a re-import?
Describe your need in one minute
A few targeted questions so I can reply with an estimate rather than another questionnaire.