Vintro Pro
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Vintro Pro
NL · FR · EN
You earn a wage today. To live on that as a dealer you have to make a good deal more than that wage — National Insurance and Income Tax sit in between.
This article works in UK rules. Every rate and threshold below is for a business in England, Wales or Northern Ireland. Scotland sets its own Income Tax bands, so the tax figures will be off there — National Insurance and VAT are the same. Trading from Belgium, the Netherlands or France? There is a card for each at the bottom.
Margin is the number you actually trade on. Not turnover, not the number of pieces.
The calculator below turns your wage around: put in what lands in your account today, and see how much margin you need to make each week to end up there as a self-employed dealer. Everything follows the UK rules for 2026/27.
| Margin on your pieces, per year— | — |
| VAT under the margin schemeone sixth (16.67%) of the difference between buying and selling price — nil if you are not registered | — |
| Fixed costs | — |
| Profit before tax and National Insurance | — |
| Class 4 National Insurance6% on profits between £12,570 and £50,270, then 2% | — |
| Income Taxafter the £12,570 personal allowance | — |
| What you keep— | — |
Worked for a sole trader in England, Wales or Northern Ireland, with no other income, no student loan and no other reliefs. A figure to start planning with, not a tax return.
The figure above is what you need to keep the same amount. But the same net amount is not the same life.
An employer contributes to your workplace pension; you get the State Pension only, and only for the years you build up. Class 2 National Insurance is what earns those years, and it is treated as paid once your profits reach £7,105. Below that you can pay it voluntarily — £3.65 a week — and it is usually worth it.
Statutory Sick Pay is for employees. If you stop, your turnover stops. Income protection is not a luxury for someone trading alone.
This is the real difference in antiques and vintage. A good month means you bought a lot, and so your account is empty. On top of the figure above, plan for a buffer that carries you three to six months without selling a single piece.
The calculator works as a sole trader, because that is how almost everyone starts. But the difference is not a detail: the same profit is taxed in completely different ways.
A company only starts to pay off when you structurally make more profit than you need to live on. As long as you draw everything you earn, you are taxed twice — Corporation Tax, then tax on the way out — and you keep less than as a sole trader, with more cost and more paperwork on top.
Anywhere near that point, have an accountant put both scenarios side by side with your own numbers.
One thing that often gets missed: if you sell through an online platform, it reports your sales to HMRC from 30 sales or about £1,700 a year — before you have registered anything. What that report means, and when you really are trading.
You must register for Self Assessment by 5 October following the end of the tax year in which you started trading. Start in June 2026 and that deadline is 5 October 2027. You get a UTR, a ten-digit reference you will need for everything after that.
Only once your VAT taxable turnover passes £90,000 in any rolling twelve months. Below that you charge no VAT at all, which is why the toggle in the calculator starts switched off. Most dealers starting out sit under it for a while.
Buy from a private seller and there was no VAT on your purchase, so you cannot reclaim any. The margin scheme means you pay VAT on your margin only: one sixth, 16.67%, of the difference between what you paid and what you sold it for, instead of on the full selling price.
You can only use it where you were not charged VAT when you bought. An antique, in law, is an item over one hundred years old; collectors' items are stamps, coins and pieces of scientific or historical interest.
This is where it goes wrong for almost everyone — not in the sums, but in the evidence. The margin scheme requires an up-to-date stock book backed by purchase and sales invoices, kept for six years, and longer while a piece is still unsold. If HMRC cannot check your margins from your records, VAT is due on the full selling price even where the goods were eligible.
How to close that off for each VAT period, step by step, is in the margin VAT per period guide.
Since 6 April 2026, sole traders whose qualifying income was over £50,000 must keep digital records and send HMRC a quarterly update. From April 2027 that drops to £30,000, and from April 2028 to £20,000. Your Self Assessment return is still due by 31 January as before.
There is a light touch on penalties in the first year, and an exemption if you genuinely cannot work digitally. But the direction is one way: a shoebox of receipts stops being an option.
Selling through eBay, Etsy, Vinted or Depop? Those platforms report your details to HMRC once you pass 30 sales or around £1,700 in a year. Clearing your own loft is not trading; buying to sell on is — even at a small scale. Be in order before that report lands, not after.
Everything above follows UK rules as they stand for 2026/27. For completeness, so you can check it or put it to your accountant:
Checked on 1 September 2026 against GOV.UK: Income Tax rates and allowances, self-employed National Insurance rates, VAT registration thresholds, the VAT margin schemes guidance, Corporation Tax rates, and the Making Tax Digital timetable. If something no longer matches, tell us — we will measure again and put a new date here.
Class 4 National Insurance plus Income Tax, after a £12,570 allowance. This is what the calculator does.
social contributions of 20.5% on your net taxable income, plus tax in four bands and a municipal surcharge. There is a page of its own for that.
A € 1,200 deduction, then 12.7 % exempt, then box 1. It has its own page.
micro-entreprise or réel: cotisations sociales as a percentage of your turnover, not your profit. Work it out at URSSAF, or read the French page.
Vintro Pro keeps your stock, your stock book and your margin VAT, and prints your labels. Exactly the paperwork this article is about — and the digital records Making Tax Digital now asks for.
Free up to 10 items, with no card details and no end date.
More than your take-home pay. Between your margin and what lands in your account sit your fixed costs, Class 4 National Insurance at 6%, and Income Tax. The calculator on this page turns your current net pay into the margin you need every week to match it.
Class 4 National Insurance is 6% on profits between 12,570 and 50,270 pounds, and 2% on anything above that. Class 2 is treated as paid automatically once profits reach 7,105 pounds, so most working dealers pay nothing extra for it.
Only once your VAT taxable turnover passes 90,000 pounds in any twelve months. Below that you can stay unregistered and charge no VAT at all. Once registered, the VAT margin scheme lets you pay one sixth of your margin instead of VAT on the full selling price.
You pay VAT at 16.67 per cent, one sixth, on the difference between what you paid for an item and what you sold it for, rather than on the full selling price. You can only use it where you were not charged VAT when you bought the item, and you must keep a stock book with purchase and sales invoices for six years. Without those records VAT is due on the full selling price.
From 6 April 2026 if your qualifying income was over 50,000 pounds, from April 2027 above 30,000 pounds, and from April 2028 above 20,000 pounds. You then keep digital records and send HMRC a quarterly update, on top of your usual Self Assessment return by 31 January.