Greetings and salutations.

Today's entry is on a workaround for tax-exempt items. We’ve received requests to accommodate a tax-exempt status with Quick Shopping Cart. While we don't have a specific category for this, there's a workaround that some of you may find useful. Those who have some untaxed items and thousands of taxed items can stop reading now. Additionally, this solution is primarily applicable for those who conduct most of their business within one state.

The Problem

Many states have items that are tax-exempt based on the nature of the item, the purchaser's intended usage, and many other local factors that would drive a developer to drink more decaffeinated beverages before trying to untangle the tax code for each city, county, and state.
 
Obviously, I'm not a tax professional, and the workaround doesn't guarantee anything, but you can use the following method to create tax-exempt sales on one or more of your products. This method is merely a suggestion and we are not responsible for the consequences of any actions taken on the basis of the information provided in this blog article

The Solution

There are several tax options within the Processing > Taxes screen. The one that we're interested in is VAT (Value Added Tax). Presently VAT is our only per product tax attribute. The remaining flat tax and state tax options are applied equally over all products.

Here's how to create an exempt item. First, switch your taxation type to VAT and save the setting. We are now at the part where people who have thousands of items should stop reading.

Go into each of your products and set the VAT percentage to your current state tax limit for all items you still want to collect tax on. For exempt items, leave the VAT at 0.

Issues: Won't this apply tax to that item regardless of the state businesses are in?

That's indeed a problem, and although it has a workaround (a coupon for the % off the purchase that equals your state’s sales tax rate ), it's not a very elegant one. However, it could work for you.

Please note these workarounds are not a substitute for us revising and extending features within future releases; we provide workarounds to give immediate assistance to our current users.