Guide · 7 minute read
How much gold can you sell in the UK without it being reported?
The short answer
In the UK there is no amount of gold a private person can sell before the sale has to be reported to HMRC, the police or anyone else. No law requires a gold buyer to report an ordinary purchase because of its size. Three sets of rules do apply. Tax is self-assessed: selling your own possessions is usually tax-free, but a single item or set sold for more than six thousand pounds can bring Capital Gains Tax, and regular buying to resell is trading. A business that pays or takes ten thousand pounds or more in cash for goods must register with HMRC as a high value dealer. And online marketplaces now send HMRC details of sellers above set levels. Separately, a buyer who suspects crime can report at any amount. This is a description of the published rules, not advice on your own position.
Send photographs first and you know roughly what you have before anything goes in the post.
The short answer: there is no reporting threshold for a private seller
Most answers to this question online are about the United States, where cash transactions over a set amount trigger a federal report. The UK has nothing equivalent for a person selling their own jewellery or coins. There is no figure above which a sale becomes reportable, no form the buyer files with HMRC because the lot was large, and, outside Scotland's metal-dealer licensing, no register of who sold how much gold this year.
What the UK does have is a set of separate rules that each look at something else: whether you owe tax, whether cash is changing hands, whether the sale went through an online platform, and whether anybody suspects the goods are stolen or the money is criminal. Each is explained below, with the statute or the HMRC guidance it comes from. None of them is triggered simply by the weight or the value of what you sell.
What can lead to information about a sale reaching an authority
| Rule | Who it applies to | What triggers it |
|---|---|---|
| Capital Gains Tax and income tax | You, the seller | A chargeable gain, or trading. You report it yourself through Self Assessment; the buyer reports nothing |
| High value dealer registration | The business buying or selling goods | Paying or taking cash of ten thousand pounds or more for goods, in one payment or linked payments |
| Digital platform reporting | The online marketplace you sell through | Making 30 or more sales, or receiving more than 2,000 euros (about seventeen hundred pounds), in a year through that platform |
| Suspicious activity reports | Anyone with a suspicion, and the regulated sector by duty | Suspicion that property is criminal. There is no amount |
Tax: what you may have to tell HMRC yourself
Selling your own things is not income. HMRC's guidance for people selling online is blunt about it: if you are not trading and just occasionally sell unwanted items, there is no tax due. Gold jewellery and coins are possessions like any other, so for most sellers there is nothing to declare at all.
Capital Gains Tax is the exception to watch. Section 262 of the Taxation of Chargeable Gains Act 1992 exempts a personal possession sold for six thousand pounds or less, so the tax can only arise on one sold for more than that; GOV.UK names jewellery, coins and stamps among its examples. A set of things sold to the same buyer, such as a set of chessmen or matching vases, and possibly a matched suite of jewellery, is treated as one possession for that threshold. The tax is on the gain, not the sale: for an inherited piece, the starting point is its value at the date of death, so a sale soon after an inheritance often shows little or no gain.
Some gold sits outside Capital Gains Tax altogether. Sovereigns dated 1837 or later and Britannia gold coins are sterling currency, and HMRC treats a gain on them as exempt. Krugerrands and other foreign coins are not, and get no chattels relief either. The tax guide for inherited gold and coins sets out each of these with the sections of the Taxation of Chargeable Gains Act 1992 behind them.
Trading is different. Buying gold in order to sell it at a profit, regularly, is a trade whatever the amounts, and trading income over the trading allowance of one thousand pounds a year has to be reported through Self Assessment. Clearing a parent's jewellery box is not trading. Buying job lots at car-boot sales every weekend to sell for their metal probably is. HMRC's badges-of-trade guidance is the test when the line is unclear.
Cash and the high value dealer rules
The one rule with a round number in it is about cash, and it falls on the business, not on you. Regulation 14 of the Money Laundering Regulations 2017 defines a high value dealer as a firm or sole trader that trades in goods and makes or receives cash payments of at least ten thousand pounds for a transaction, whether in one payment or in several that appear to be linked. A business in that position must register with HMRC before it takes such a payment, and then run identity checks and keep records under the regulations.
The threshold is new in that form. Until 30 June 2026 it was 10,000 euros; the Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing (Amendment) Regulations 2026 replaced it with ten thousand pounds from that date. When this guide was checked, GOV.UK's registration guidance still gave the old euro figure, so if the two disagree when you read them, the legislation is the authority.
Cash here means notes, coins and traveller's cheques, including cash paid straight into the business's bank account. A bank transfer is not cash, and a business that only ever pays by transfer, card or cheque does not become a high value dealer however large its payments. Assaypost pays by bank transfer to a UK account in the seller's own name and never in cash, so these rules do not apply to it; the responsible sourcing page says so and explains what it does instead.
Splitting a cash sale does not avoid anything
The regulations count payments that appear to be linked as one transaction. Selling the same lot to a cash buyer over several visits, to keep each payment under the threshold, is exactly what that wording is for.
Selling online: the platform reporting rules
If you sell through an online marketplace rather than to a buyer directly, the platform itself may now pass your details to HMRC. Under the digital platform reporting rules, platforms collect information about sellers and report it each year, and GOV.UK says they do not need to report a seller who makes fewer than 30 sales of goods in a year and receives 2,000 euros (about seventeen hundred pounds) or less. The first reports, covering 2024, went to HMRC in January 2025.
HMRC was careful to say that the rules created no new tax. Being reported by a platform means HMRC receives information; it does not mean you owe anything. Whether tax is due is still decided by the tests in the section above.
Suspicion, stolen goods and why buyers ask who you are
The report people half-expect is the one about crime, and it works on suspicion rather than size. Part 7 of the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 makes it an offence to acquire, use or possess criminal property, with defences that include reporting the suspicion to the National Crime Agency and getting consent, or paying adequate consideration. Handling goods known or believed to be stolen is a separate offence under the Theft Act 1968. Businesses in the regulated sector have a duty to report a suspicion; others may choose to. A small parcel can be reported. Nothing makes a large parcel reportable if nothing about it is suspicious.
That is the real reason a gold buyer asks for identification and, for inherited pieces, some sign that you are entitled to sell. It protects the buyer from handling stolen jewellery and gives an honest seller a clean record of the sale. It is not a report to anybody. The guide to identity and provenance checks explains what is asked and when.
One rule that people sometimes expect to apply does not. The Scrap Metal Dealers Act 2013, which bans scrap metal dealers in England and Wales from paying cash, defines scrap metal so as to exclude gold, silver and any alloy that is 2 per cent or more gold or silver by weight. Selling gold or silver jewellery is not a scrap metal sale under that Act.
Seller risks and exceptions
- This page describes the rules as published. It is not tax or legal advice, and nobody at Assaypost is an accountant or a solicitor. If a sale is large, an estate is involved or you are unsure whether you are trading, ask a qualified adviser before you sell.
- Executors sell as personal representatives, and the estate has its own position on Capital Gains Tax and Inheritance Tax. The probate guide covers what an executor can do and when.
- Thresholds change. The high value dealer figure changed in June 2026, the Capital Gains Tax annual exempt amount is set in Budgets, and platform rules are revised. Check GOV.UK and legislation.gov.uk on the day you rely on a figure.
- Keep your own record. The written offer, the itemised list and the bank transfer are the evidence of what you sold, to whom and for how much, if HMRC or a beneficiary ever asks.
- Anyone offering to buy gold for cash with no questions asked is not protecting you. A sale with no record is a sale you cannot prove.
When not to use the scrap route
The reporting rules rarely change how you should sell. The tax rules sometimes do. A tin of pre-1837 sovereigns, a coin collection built up over years, or a single piece that could sell for more than the chattels threshold on its own may each be better handled after a word with an accountant, and the coins may be worth more to a numismatic buyer than as gold. The guide to selling sovereigns without losing the premium covers that side.
Ask before you decide anything
Send photographs on WhatsApp or through the photo estimate page and a person will say what the pieces appear to be and whether any of them should go elsewhere first. That costs nothing and creates no obligation. If you decide to sell, request a postal pack; payment is by bank transfer to your own account, which gives you the record this guide recommends keeping.
Questions sellers ask
Do gold buyers report sales to HMRC?
Not as a matter of routine. No UK rule requires a gold buyer to report a purchase from a private seller because of its size. A buyer that takes or pays large amounts in cash must be registered with HMRC as a high value dealer and keep records, and any buyer may report a suspicion of crime, but an ordinary sale by bank transfer is not reported to anyone.
Do I pay tax when I sell gold jewellery in the UK?
Usually not. Selling your own possessions is not income. Capital Gains Tax can arise on a gain when a single item, or a set sold together, goes for more than six thousand pounds. Regularly buying gold to resell is trading and is taxed as income. Check GOV.UK or an accountant for your own position.
Is there a limit on how much gold I can sell for cash?
No limit applies to you. A business that pays or takes ten thousand pounds or more in cash for goods must first register with HMRC as a high value dealer, which is why many buyers pay only by bank transfer. The threshold was 10,000 euros until 30 June 2026.
Why does a gold buyer need my ID if nothing is reported?
To protect against buying stolen goods or handling criminal property, which is an offence for anyone. An identity check and, for inherited pieces, proof that you may sell them give both sides a clean record. It is the buyer's own safeguard, not a report.
Do I have to declare selling gold sovereigns?
Sovereigns dated 1837 or later and Britannia gold coins are sterling currency, and HMRC treats gains on them as exempt from Capital Gains Tax, so a private sale normally has nothing to declare. Older sovereigns and foreign coins such as Krugerrands are treated differently, as the tax guide explains.
Ready to ask about yours?
Send photographs and a person will tell you what the marks suggest, what looks plated, and whether anything ought to be seen by a specialist first. Free, in writing, no obligation.
Nothing is sold until you say yes. Decline and it all comes back by tracked post, free; ask for part of it back and a fresh offer is made for the rest.
If a piece is worth more than its metal
A signed brooch, a date-run sovereign, a watch that still runs, a piece of early silver: anything that looks worth more whole is flagged to you before it is treated as metal, and you can take it back at that point.