If you sell through Amazon or bol.com from a Dutch company, your bookkeeping works differently than it would for a standalone webshop. Neither marketplace pays you the full sale price. Both deduct commission, fulfilment costs and sometimes reserves first, then transfer only what's left. Bookkeeping for Amazon and bol.com sellers has to capture that gap between gross sales and net payout correctly, or your VAT return and annual accounts won't add up, and that gap catches out a lot of founders moving from a US or UK setup into the Dutch system for the first time.
Why bookkeeping for Amazon and bol.com sellers looks different
With your own webshop, every payment arrives as a single, traceable transaction: the customer pays, you receive it. Amazon and bol.com instead settle in batches, usually weekly or biweekly, with all their fees already netted out inside that one transfer. If you record only the amount that lands in your bank account, you understate both your real revenue and your deductible costs, and that error shows up in both your VAT filing and your profit calculation.
What bol.com sellers need to track
Bol.com charges a sales commission per product category, plus separate fees if you use their fulfilment service (Bol Fulfilment). The seller portal gives you periodic statements breaking gross sales, commission, fulfilment costs and returns out line by line. Use those statements directly in your bookkeeping, not just the net amount that hits your account, otherwise you'll end up declaring VAT on a figure that doesn't match your actual sales.
What's different for Amazon sellers
Amazon uses the same building blocks under different names: a referral fee per sale, and if you use Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA), separate storage and shipping fees. If you're also selling to customers elsewhere in the EU through Amazon, the OSS scheme comes into play once your cross-border sales cross the €10,000 threshold, exactly as it would for a standalone webshop. Amazon's own Pan-EU programme doesn't change that: the VAT obligation still sits with you as the seller, not with the platform.
A worked example: from gross sales to net payout
The easiest way to book a marketplace settlement statement is to break it into its components rather than record it as one lump sum:
| Line item | Amount |
|---|---|
| Gross sales this period | €4,200 |
| Platform sales commission | - €630 |
| Fulfilment costs (storage/shipping) | - €340 |
| Returns processed | - €180 |
| Net payout to your account | €3,050 |
The gross €4,200 is what goes on your VAT return as revenue. The commission and fulfilment costs are business expenses you book separately, and they reduce your taxable profit rather than simply disappearing against revenue. If you only book the €3,050 that actually arrives, you're under-reporting both your revenue and your expenses, and that's exactly the kind of gap a tax audit flags.
Frequently asked questions
Do I pay VAT on the commission Amazon or bol.com deducts? No. The commission is a business cost with its own VAT, which you can reclaim as input tax if the platform issues a proper invoice. You charge VAT on your gross selling price to the customer, not on the net amount you're paid out.
What if I sell on both bol.com and Amazon at the same time? Keep revenue, costs and VAT separately identifiable per platform in your bookkeeping. That way, if the Belastingdienst ever asks, you can show exactly which amount came from which platform in which period.
How do I book a return the platform already processed? A return reduces your revenue in the period the platform processes it, not the period of the original sale. The platform's settlement statement usually states exactly which period a given return falls into.
New to running a company in the Netherlands?
At Sophy &Co. we work with founders who set up a Dutch entity specifically to sell on marketplaces like Amazon and bol.com, often before they've even finished registering with the KVK. Book a call and we'll walk you through what that setup actually involves and where marketplace payouts fit into it, no Dutch required on your side.
Our team is women-led, mixes male and female bookkeepers, and is proudly LGBTQIA-friendly. Between us we cover English, Dutch, Italian, Chinese, Spanish, Papiamento, German, and some French and Polish, so you can talk through your numbers in the language you're most comfortable in. We can also put you in touch with the banks, lawyers and notaries you'll need along the way, plus other founders who've been through the same marketplace setup before you.
How we handle this for you
At Sophy &Co. we translate Amazon and bol.com settlement statements into bookkeeping that actually reconciles: gross sales, commission and fulfilment costs all recorded where they belong. Share your sales and payout statements with us, that's the only part that's on you, we take care of the rest. One fixed monthly fee, cancel any time.
Take a look at our e-commerce bookkeeping services, check whether your cross-border sales are already over the OSS threshold, or see our pricing. Not sure how your situation fits? Get in touch for a no-obligation conversation.
Want the official rules straight from the source? See the Belastingdienst on VAT and e-commerce, or the Kamer van Koophandel for general business registration information.