How to set up sales taxes for different states

[CoastWriter]

I'm brand new to Square and not entirely sure what I'm doing. I'm sure I'll get the hang of it, but for now, here's my question:

I've set up all my items and also set up sales tax for the two different states I sell in. Is there a way, on the mobile app, to assign the proper tax at the time of sale? I can't seem to find it. All I can find is how to set up each item to include the sales tax for one state or another. Do I need to set up separate items for each state so the sales tax is properly applied?

[Donnie-M]

@CoastWriter Are you talking about doing online sales?  or do you do in person sales and have locations in 2 states? or do you move around and do sales in 2 different states?  Last question would be, do you take orders and then just ship to 2 states and manually enter them in the point of sale?

To manually change the tax, when you enter an item in the point of sale you can tap on the item and before you hit (ADD) you can scroll down to the bottom and you will see sliders to change the sales tax that is applied.  Also, if the item is already on the ticket you can tap it to edit the item and do the same thing.

You can go into your online dashboard and disable a tax globally without having to edit all of your items.  So if you are moving around or as in my case tax free week, you can just turn a tax off till you turn it back on.

If you want to give a little more detail, I am sure I can get you a more direct answer.  Online sales the system will add taxes automatically for you, which is awesome.

Donnie-M

[wsallaman]

Donnie, I;m creating a website and it's not adding sales tax.  Can you walk me through how to do that?  Thank  you for your help!

Wendy

[CoastWriter · Accepted solution]

Thank you so much! You solved my problem. I've spent two days trying to figure out how to add sales tax according to where I was selling the item, and nowhere did I see that all I had to do was tap the item once I added it to checkout. My business is domiciled in Virginia, but I do a lot of my sales in North Carolina.

I also have not been able to find a way to do a "test" checkout without having to incur the fee. I hate to use a customer as a guinea pig. Do you know if there's a way to do that? 

I'm a bit disappointed in the lack of relevant information on the Square website, but I very much appreciate your assistance.

[Donnie-M]

@CoastWriter You can ring up a sale and hit charge and it should present you with a total.  I would just "cash" it out and then you can go back into your transaction history and do a refund if you really need to do it.  If you want to, set up a "test" item that is 1.00$ and just ring it up and swipe your personal card.  Sure it will cost you the swipe fee and percent (roughly 12 or 13 cents), but you can test out your receipts, e-mail, everything.

I strongly recommend doing a couple test checkouts on yourself.  It is a great way to familiarize yourself and see how things look.  It is pretty easy to edit sales tax in the point of sale app.

You could actually just have both taxes on your items and when you can go to the bottom of the screen and tap tax and take off the one you  don't want.

Here are some screen shots, hope this helps.

Donnie-M

[CoastWriter]

Thank you so much. You've been very helpful. I appreciate you taking the time to assist me. 😊

[SerenitySkyyLLC]

Hi Donnie-M,

Thank you for your help on this topic.  If I may ask, I am selling jewelry online and I sell between Nevada and California and want to include the sales tax on my items.  I currently only sell online through link tree and it only lets me set about 5 price points so I have to tell my customers the amount to enter on the square tab.  Is there a way to just have them go directly to my square and order so I can include the tax?