proper New York sales tax set up? Has anyone accomplished it?

[haosmark]

Does anyone here know how to set up NY sales tax? I thought going by zip code is what I could do, but, apparently that's wrong.

So far the only solution I found is to charge 7% for all zones and then eat the difference during filing.

 

Can anyone suggest how to go about it?

Edited November 4, 2012 by haosmark (see edit history)

[Dh42]

All you have to do is charge sales tax for everyone in NY, for where you have your business license at. You don't have to charge the different city tax rates for your customers, you just charge the sales tax rate for the city that you are in.

[haosmark]

Sadly, this doesn't apply to NY state

[Dh42]

Actually it applies to everywhere. You should have a license for your business, in which you pay your local taxes. Stores do not ask you where you are from so they can charge you your local tax rate, you pay the tax rate where the store is. It applies to NY the same way it applies to everywhere else.

[haosmark]

"New York's retail sales tax is a destination tax. The point of delivery or the point at which possession is transferred by the vendor to the purchaser determines the rate of tax to be collected. Sales delivered outside New York State are exempt from tax."

http://www.tax.ny.gov/bus/st/sales_tax_rates.htm

 

I've been reading about this all day. At first it may seem as if FOB origin terms would allow to do it the way you described, but sadly it's not a valid loophole (some use tax technicality doesn't allow it).

[bellini13]

i have setup the NY state tax rules on a shop in the past. As you say, taxes are based on where you are "delivering to". For a brick and mortar that does not ship, they would collect the tax rate that applies to their locale, since the store location would be defined as the "possession transfer". So a brick and mortar in Suffolk county would collect 8.625 (A combination of the 4% NY State rate, plus the 4.625% Suffolk County rate.

 

This site has been useful to me in the past in explaining the calculation.

http://www.earthodyssey.com/sales_tax.html#pulling2

 

Sales tax is generally based on the county rate, with a few exceptions. Together with the state rate of 4.00% (a decrease from 4.25% on June 1, 2005), and in some counties a transit rate of 0.375% (an increase from 0.25% on June 1, 2005), the total combined rate can range from 7.00% (several counties) to 8.75% (Oneida County and Erie County).

 

I have found the "easiest" way to achieve this in Prestashop was the following

1. In shipping | county section, you would create all the counties in NY
   
2. For each county, you would define the zip codes that belong in that county
   
3. Then in Payment | Taxes section you would enable Taxes, and have it "based on" delivery address
   
4. Then in Payment | Taxes section you would create the various Tax rates that apply (8.625, 8.375, 8.875 etc...) across the various counties in NY
   
5. Then in Payment | Taxes Rules you would create a "NY State" rule
   
6. Then you would edit the "NY State" rule.
   
   1. 
      
   2. For all non-US zones you would have "No Tax".
      
   3. For the US zone, you would then apply "No tax" to all countries in this zone.
      
   4. Then expand USA, then expand New York, then for each county, apply the correct rate that you created in step 4.
      

This will take a bit of work, especially the part where you have to create all the counties and zip codes. Good luck!

[clayton29657]

Actually it applies to everywhere. You should have a license for your business, in which you pay your local taxes. Stores do not ask you where you are from so they can charge you your local tax rate, you pay the tax rate where the store is. It applies to NY the same way it applies to everywhere else.

 

Hey designhouse42

 

Actually in South Carolina I have the same type of issue. Each county in the state has different use & sales tax rates and by SC law you've to keep it separate. I am just charging the lowest sales tax between all the counties then eating the difference but I also get a discount from the state so it pretty much evens out.

[Dh42]

Those are odd tax laws that I have never heard of. Have either of you tried http://www.avalara.com/e-commerce/prestashop

[haosmark]

Yeah, it's complicated. Looks like charging the lowest rate and eating the difference as a part of your expense is the best way to go.

 

I looked into Alavara, they don't give pricing on their website, so I googled it. From what I can tell it can be $300+ a year, thus it's more economical to recalculate and eat the difference for start ups.

Building zip code tax base, seems attractive, but in the end, it's still wrong. You'll end up saving time by going the minimal tax rate route, imo.

 

Thanks for discussing this with me guys, it helped a lot.

[SeanYi]

 

I have found the "easiest" way to achieve this in Prestashop was the following

1. In shipping | county section, you would create all the counties in NY
   
2. For each county, you would define the zip codes that belong in that county
   
3. Then in Payment | Taxes section you would enable Taxes, and have it "based on" delivery address
   
4. Then in Payment | Taxes section you would create the various Tax rates that apply (8.625, 8.375, 8.875 etc...) across the various counties in NY
   
5. Then in Payment | Taxes Rules you would create a "NY State" rule
   
6. Then you would edit the "NY State" rule.
   
   1. 
      
   2. For all non-US zones you would have "No Tax".
      
   3. For the US zone, you would then apply "No tax" to all countries in this zone.
      
   4. Then expand USA, then expand New York, then for each county, apply the correct rate that you created in step 4.
      

 

It looks like good tip for prestashop 1.4. but how about 1.5?

I totally embarrassed about this change.

[jimhill10]

I am in the processing of implementing the Avalara module just for the reasons you discussed. The pricing is really very reasonable. They charge you a small setup fee (around $50) then you purchase an annual contract consisting of a "bucket" of a finite number of transactions per year. We are talking like a total investment of $150 per year for a few hundred transactions per year. This is a bargain in light of the time you will spend on this, and it gets even more complicated if the invoice shows an incorrect tax amount. The module also does the address correction automatically, and it provides reports for all the state sales taxes in the states in which you have nexus. Our firm has nexus in six states but since our store is only downloadable software we get out of Florida for that exception. You just set up the states in which you have nexus and the system does the rest. We hope to go live yet today and I will let you know what happens.

[haosmark]

I am in the processing of implementing the Avalara module just for the reasons you discussed. The pricing is really very reasonable. They charge you a small setup fee (around $50) then you purchase an annual contract consisting of a "bucket" of a finite number of transactions per year. We are talking like a total investment of $150 per year for a few hundred transactions per year. This is a bargain in light of the time you will spend on this, and it gets even more complicated if the invoice shows an incorrect tax amount. The module also does the address correction automatically, and it provides reports for all the state sales taxes in the states in which you have nexus. Our firm has nexus in six states but since our store is only downloadable software we get out of Florida for that exception. You just set up the states in which you have nexus and the system does the rest. We hope to go live yet today and I will let you know what happens.

When I was researching it, it seemed very expensive to implement Alvara. I basically changed my cart choice to opencart and implemented the proper tax look up by county, that has a backup option of giong by zip code (in case the code couldn't identify the county).

 

All I can say is, if you are new and very small then you don't need services like Alvara. You will be fine by implementing tax based on zip code. Most of your sales will be probably out of state, so tax wont even be involved.

[jimhill10]

Thanks for the helpful info. Jim

[jimhill10]

I spent an hour on the phone with Avalara and although they were very nice we cannot get the Avatax module to work in Prestashop. I tried everything under the sun to get it to work. When I disabled the module and went back to the old tax rules it crashed the store. Turning it back on brought things back to life but the tax still does not show in the order at all. When the customer begins the cart it shows the tax as 0.00. By the time they are at the last stage where they have to select a payment method the tax line is missing altogether. I hate to abandon the Prestashop after all the work we did but we may have no other option left. Avalara said they would attempt to escalate this and reach out to someone, maybe the person who developed the tax module. I attached two screenshots showing what happened.

 

Are there consultants that we could hire to see if they could get this going? Thanks in advance, Jim

Edited February 16, 2013 by jimhill10 (see edit history)

[haosmark]

PS is a PHP cart. The nice thing about it is that it's a fairly simple language + PS is fairly popular and there are dozens of developers available out there.

Either make a dedicated post this forum or use one of the freelancing sites to find someone who will take the job of fixing it.

I don't remember how PS works at all, but if it's anything like opencart, you need to set up each item as taxable in admin area.

[jimhill10]

We posted it and thanks for your help. That link is

http://www.prestashop.com/forums/topic/225726-looking-for-assistance-on-a-prestashop-installation/

 

Jim

[mikesandburg]

I am new to PrestaShop, but became disconcerted when attempting to set up the localization for sales tax. PrestaShop was designed in France, and hence the designers are apparently not familiar with the complexities of US sales tax rates. The designers apparently believed each state has a sales tax rate. This is partly true, including 7 states (AK,DE, MT, NH, NM, OR, and SD) where the rate is zero. They accommodate 52 tax state jurisdictions (this is correct, 50 states plus PR and DC). What they did not account for, however, are the multitude of local sales tax rates within those 52 jurisdictions. It appears they attempt to resolve this problem by accommodating up to 6 local possibilities within each state. But this simply doesn't cut it.

 

As HAOSMARK has posted, in NY and many other states the tax is based upon the destination of the product. Each county has its own tax rate, and several cities add more. In New York State, for example, each of 62 counties has its own tax rate, and within these counties, some cities and special districts have their own tax rate. There are, in fact, 12 different rates among 77 different tax jurisdictions in New York State (which may be a county, city, or district). There could be more if any particular jurisdiction chooses to change its rate. Entering a different rate based upon zipcode would be a daunting task for a merchant using PrestaShop. There are 2,087 zipcodes in NY State.

 

NY is not unique. State and local governments throughout the US rely very heavily upon sales tax revenues. In California there are 17 different rates among 147 tax jurisdictions. In Washington State there are 20 different rates among 199 jurisdictions. In Colorado there are 61 different rates among 184 tax jurisdictions.

 

The idea of collecting a lower than required tax and eating the difference when it comes time to pay the taxman will become a very expensive solution as your business grows. The other solutions mentioned by some also seem expensive to a startup operation. I am debating whether to try to find another shopping cart designed for the US market, or writing a plugin for PrestaShop that will more accurately account for taxes based upon point of delivery. As you may sense from this post, I have already done some research in preparation for the latter. This will take some considerable effort, however, and so I wonder how many PrestaShop users sense a need for such a solution, and how many would be willing to make a financial contribution to the effort. Because tax rates are subject to change at the whim of state and local legislators, this would require an ongoing commitment to maintain correct rates throughout the country. I could do this if enough PrestaShop users would be willing to support the effort. If interested, please email me at [email protected]

[jimhill10]

What I ended up doing was to install and then configure the Avalara tax module. This has saved me an immense amount of grief as I was having the same issues as you. I guess it depends upon how many transactions you are doing but there rates are really quite fair. There was a bug in the Avatax module but they fixed it quickly and I am up an running. You just set up the states in which you have nexus and that is all there is to it. If you have more complicated tax scenarios Avalara will help you set that up. They can handle whatever level of complexity including charging tax only on a certain portion of the order, you just have to enter the upc item numbers into Avalara (or some sort of item number you set up in your store). I am very happy and going live soon with the store using the Avalara tax module. They sell access to the service via a small monthly fee and then a finite number of transaction buckets. So it depends upon how many sales you expect each month. Jim

[tdr170]

In 1.4 setting up taxes is actually fairly simple, first you add all the counties in your state under payment, taxes.

Then you add the zips under shipping, counties, If you are in a destination state you will most likely need to enter the zips one by one as some counties use the same zip but have different surtax rates.

I used Notepad++ and created a text file with all the counties their tax rate and all zips, then when entering the zips if I came across a zip that was already in use I could use notepad to find that zip and place it in the higher surtaxed rate county, the idea here is that no one would complain if charged to little tax but may send me a message if charged to much.

At that point I could move that zip to their county so on their next order they would be charged correctly.

Last you need th go to payment, tax rules, your state, north america, united states, your state and change the drop down to apply both taxes as well as selecting the tax rate.

You will need to do this for all counties even those that do not charge a surtax otherwise there will be some strange behavior when someone from those counties make a purchase. (experience)

 

In 1.5 collecting surtax for counties just is not possible as the zip code entry has changed to only include a zip range.

I experimented with this and an issue that comes up is if you have two counties with overlapping zips the customer will be charged surtax for both counties.

I have made several (3) forge reports about this and for the most part have been ignored.

 

 

http://forge.prestashop.com/browse/PSCFV-6233

http://forge.prestashop.com/browse/PSCFV-6091

http://forge.prestashop.com/browse/PSCFV-3757

 

 

 

I can offer further help with setting up taxes in 1.4 if needed

 

You can also watch the videos posted here and you should have a great understanding of how to set up taxes, this is where I learned from years ago.

 

http://www.prestatraining.com/set-up-taxes-in-prestashop-v1-4/

[daquity36]

Today, I spent maybe 5 hours inputting all the zip codes for New York state and decided to share it. Change the file extension from txt to sql. You're welcome.

 

EDIT: As for setting up tax, refer to entry #6. That's exactly what I did.

ps_county_zip_code.txt

ps_county.txt

Edited March 22, 2013 by daquity36 (see edit history)

[jj33002]

In 1.4 setting up taxes is actually fairly simple, first you add all the counties in your state under payment, taxes.

Then you add the zips under shipping, counties, If you are in a destination state you will most likely need to enter the zips one by one as some counties use the same zip but have different surtax rates.

I used Notepad++ and created a text file with all the counties their tax rate and all zips, then when entering the zips if I came across a zip that was already in use I could use notepad to find that zip and place it in the higher surtaxed rate county, the idea here is that no one would complain if charged to little tax but may send me a message if charged to much.

At that point I could move that zip to their county so on their next order they would be charged correctly.

Last you need th go to payment, tax rules, your state, north america, united states, your state and change the drop down to apply both taxes as well as selecting the tax rate.

You will need to do this for all counties even those that do not charge a surtax otherwise there will be some strange behavior when someone from those counties make a purchase. (experience)

 

In 1.5 collecting surtax for counties just is not possible as the zip code entry has changed to only include a zip range.

I experimented with this and an issue that comes up is if you have two counties with overlapping zips the customer will be charged surtax for both counties.

I have made several (3) forge reports about this and for the most part have been ignored.

 

 

http://forge.prestas...owse/PSCFV-6233

http://forge.prestas...owse/PSCFV-6091

http://forge.prestas...owse/PSCFV-3757

 

 

 

I can offer further help with setting up taxes in 1.4 if needed

 

You can also watch the videos posted here and you should have a great understanding of how to set up taxes, this is where I learned from years ago.

 

http://www.prestatra...restashop-v1-4/

Did you ever find anything else out about this for? I live in Arkansas and we have county and city taxes that have to be applied on a destination base and I am struggling to find a way to make this work. I am going to settle for now and take the overlapping zips and put them to the lowest rate between them and eat the rest. Hopefully someone can come up with a better fix.

[tdr170]

In 1.4 my taxes work perfect its 1.5 that is the issue in that you can only enter a range.

Prestashop seems to be ignoring my request on the forge for Tax help.

What ver of Prestashop are you using.

[jj33002]

In 1.4 my taxes work perfect its 1.5 that is the issue in that you can only enter a range.

Prestashop seems to be ignoring my request on the forge for Tax help.

What ver of Prestashop are you using.

I just started using it and I have 1.5

[tdr170]

With 1.5 it is almost impossible to create the counties with the zips as the range just does not work.

You would need to enter County for every zip in that county, just not practical.

So for now I will remain on 1.4 for my live shop If they never fix this I will have no choice but to move on.

[jj33002]

Is there an easy way for me to get everything I have done in 1.5 to 1.4 version? I have already hand entered in cities and zips and counties, and the only place where I am going to have a huge problem is that there are a couple of big cities that have completely different taxes but the same zip code. Most of them I was able to work out by just keeping the laws for the big city and deleting the smaller one all together. When I say small, I think the biggest one I deleted had a population of around 500 people. Most of them were way smaller than that. So odds are it will most likely never be a problem. Any way, I hope that someone comes up with a fix for this or if there is an easy way for me to transfer everything to 1.4.

 

Thanks,

[tdr170]

Not really, 1.5 has completely different database tables for the counties and zips. Sorry.

[jj33002]

Well that just sucks! Haha. Well I appreciate your help.