How DashVue works out your profit

This article explains the exact calculation DashVue uses to turn a sale into a net profit figure on your dashboard and reports, so you know what is included, what is stripped out, and why some orders are left out of your margin figures.

The profit formula

For every order, DashVue works out net profit as:

Net profit = (sale price minus any refund) minus cost of goods minus eBay fees minus postage minus expenses

Each piece comes from a different place. The sale price and any refund come from the order itself. Cost of goods is whatever you have recorded for that listing or item. eBay fees are the fees eBay actually charged on that sale. Postage is what you paid to ship it. Expenses are any other costs you have logged against the order or period, such as packaging or storage. Subtracting all of them from the net sale amount gives the profit figure shown on your dashboard and in your reports.

Why the figures are VAT-inclusive, then adjusted

DashVue starts every figure in the formula, sale price, fees, postage, expenses, as the real, VAT-inclusive amount that actually changed hands. That matches what you see on eBay and on your receipts.

If you are VAT-registered, DashVue then strips out the output VAT on the sale price before arriving at your net profit. This is what keeps the profit figure meaningful for a VAT-registered business: it shows what you actually keep, not a number inflated by VAT you are going to have to hand to HMRC. If you are not VAT-registered, this adjustment simply does not apply and your VAT-inclusive figures stand as your real profit.

Why orders without a cost price are excluded from margin

Cost of goods is the one figure in the formula that eBay never provides. It only exists if you have entered it. If an order has no cost price recorded against it, DashVue cannot subtract a real cost of goods figure, so that order is excluded from margin calculations rather than being shown with a guessed or zero cost that would distort the result.

This is why cost of goods coverage matters so much. The more of your listings have an accurate cost price attached, the more of your orders are included in your margin figures, and the more your dashboard reflects your actual profitability rather than a partial picture. Sparse cost data does not just leave gaps, it can make your overall margin look better or worse than it really is, because the orders that are missing a cost are the ones being left out of the calculation entirely.

What this means day to day

In practice, the net profit and margin figures on your dashboard and reports are only as good as the inputs behind them: accurate cost of goods, correctly logged expenses, and postage that matches what you actually paid. eBay fees are pulled through automatically, so those do not need manual upkeep, but cost of goods and expenses do. See the related articles below for more on recording cost of goods and logging expenses.