Getting Things Set Up
[1] Choosing Your Seller Plan
Before you create your business you’ll need to decide which Amazon selling plan you’ll be using. Here you can see the comparison between both individual and professional selling plans.
Need to register as a Sole Trader or set up a Limited (Ltd) company
Charged £30.00 / month (alongside FBA fees).
No limit to the number of units you can sell
Access to advertising and advanced selling tools
Can sell products in restricted categories
Access to the Buy Box
We'd advise most people to get started with a professional selling plan; that way you can sell unlimited products on Amazon, this also works out to be slightly cheaper each month.
If you choose to go for an individual plan you will not need to set up as a Sole Trader or Limited company, so you can skip the next step! If you choose to start with the professional plan, you will need to set up as either a Sole Trader or Limited company. You can always start as an individual and convert to a professional plan later down the line if you'd prefer.
Before getting started with setting things up, you must be over the age of 18 - You will not be able to create an Amazon seller account if you are under the age of 18.
[2] Registering your business
As we discussed above, if you choose to sell via a professional plan, you’ll need to register as a Sole Trader or Limited company. Firstly, we'll go over the advantaged and disadvantages of both. It's worth nothing that you are able to convert from being a Sole Trader to Limited company later down the line, however, this can require verification causing temporary account suspensions.
Costs £50.00 to set up as a Limited company
A Limited Company can be set up in around a day once you have completed the relevant process via Companies House, meaning you’ll be able to start selling sooner, usually within 48 hours.
Generally, Limited companies are more tax efficient, especially if you already have a highly paid job.
Limited liability - an Ltd protects your personal finances (your personal finances and company finances are separate from one another). If you set up as a Sole Trader, there will be no legal distinction between your personal finances and the business finances. If you are looking to move from Arbitrage to Wholesale, or simply start with Wholesale, you'll want to have a Ltd company. Register a Ltd Company with Companies House
Generally, we find that most members will choose to go with a Ltd company due to both a quicker start-up time and better tax efficiency. If you have any questions regarding the two, please either head into the Live Chat within Seller Circle, speak to an accountant or speak to HMRC directly. You can contact HMRC here: 0300 200 3310. More information can also be found here.
[3] Creating an Amazon account
Once you’ve completed the steps [1] and [2], obtained your UTR number via the post (Sole Trader), or your Ltd company registration number via email, you’ll be able to set up your Amazon account. So, let's get the ball rolling!
Make sure you are registering a new account, if you’ve had an account previously use this; Amazon are very strict on sellers having more than one account.
Create your Amazon Selling Account - Make sure you register as a business
Make sure you create a brand-new Gmail account to register your business. This should be a different email address than any pre-existing addresses which are linked to your personal Amazon buying account.
Make sure you use the same information; addresses, names etc, as the information you've submitted on the Government website when incorporating/creating your business.
You'll be asked for your business type. If you're a sole trader, make sure to choose "Sole Proprietor", or if you're an LTD, make sure to choose "Privately-Owned Business".
Amazon will ask for some form of ID as well as proof of address - for this, you can use anything from a bank statement to utlity bills.
If you are registering your Amazon account using an individual plan, or as a Sole Trader on a professional plan, when Amazon asks for your company name, enter your full name. If you’ve registered as an Ltd company and are therefore using the professional plan, enter your Ltd company name ie. MK Distribution Ltd.
If you’ve signed up for a professional plan, your first selling subscription payment will be taken from the bank account you have linked, with any subsequent payments being taken from your Amazon account balance. Amazon will ask for a “credit card” for this, however, a debit card is completely fine.
From here, you'll be asked you to choose a store name - if you are Ltd make sure to use a different name to your Ltd company, this way you can make sure your Amazon store has a little more privacy and more of a struggle for people to find your specific Amazon store. It's worth noting that you can change your store name at any time.
Amazon will then ask a question in regard to UPCs - make sure to click "Yes".
You'll then be asked if you are "the manufacturer or brand owner" of any of the products you'll be selling on Amazon - make sure to click "No"
Once you've succesfully submitted your details one of the following two things will happen: [1] You'll be approved instantly. [2] You'll be asked to participate in a few minute long webcall within the following 7 days in order to verify your indentity
[4] Letter of Authorisation
Once you’ve successfully created your Amazon selling account, you may be asked to provide a "letter of authorisation". This is generally for larger businesses whereby an employee might have set up an Amazon account rather than a company director themselves. The majority of the time, you will be the company director but also the manager of the Amazon account. Therefore, you are going to need to write a letter of authorisation for for yourself - yes, we know, this makes absolutely no sense, however, Amazon require it...
To do this, you are going to need a company letterhead. This will need to include the following:
[1] The company logo. [2] Name. [3] Address. [4] Contact details.
Canva is a great place to create company letterheads if you are struggling, there are also templates you can use on Word and Google Docs.
Once you’ve created the letterhead, please use the following template and send it off to Amazon.
A business bank account is an essential feature of your Amazon business. It will be used for all your transactions to suppliers/stores alongside receiving funds from your Amazon sales.
Revolut has been one of the main bank accounts that Seller Circle members use for their Amazon journey, as such, we have partnered directly with Revolut. Whether you're a Sole Trader or Ltd company, Revolut has both options, alongside various different plans tailored to the features that you want!
If you are already set up as an Amazon Seller, changing from a Sole Trader to a Limited company can cause issues as the process of moving an Amazon Seller Account to a new entity requires re-verification, which tends to result in significant delays.
Make sure you have completed all of the steps above, and have all of the paperwork ready, before informing Amazon of the change. Do not close your Sole Trader business bank account before the conversion is complete, Amazon may still ask for this.
You can now inform Amazon of the change of entity. The best way of doing this is to open a case log/live chat on Seller Central via the support section. They will most likely ask you to contact seller-verification-enquiry@amazon.co.uk with the requested documents and answer a few questions in regard to the change. They will then give you the steps to do the conversion.
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