The conversation

mgkimsalHNSource author
Business & incomeExperience excerpt · English

I did some POS work for a company years back and tried to integrate 'taxes'

… I did some POS work for a company years back and tried to integrate 'taxes'. I was replacing an earlier system, and I used modern tax SaaS (avalara, IIRC). The client was telling me all my taxes were wrong, but... digging in... Avalara was correct , and the client had been calculating and collecting taxes wrong for... about 15 years. I had no way to try to figure out how they were doing it 'wrong' to match how they'd been doing it. This had to do with 'service/labor' income vs 'product' vs 'chemicals' they used. Different counties in the same state had different rates (which changed over different months/years historically). Tribal lands had different rules still. The biggest lesson I took from that was... if you do something (tax calculations), do it consistently and uniformly. Should they have been audited, it may have looked a bit better that they were at least consistent in their tax issues, instead of looking like they were explicitly trying to somehow intentionally scam customers or the govt.

Original discussionCable companies, automakers try to derail FTC, FCC quest to kill misleading fees122 source comments · at import
6

What was this responding to?

Parent context · original excerpt

JI
jimt1234HN

I once read a comment here on HN from someone in Australia, saying that, according to local laws, advertised prices must match the final price, including taxes, fees, etc. So, if the price says "$100", you're gonna pay $100. That blew my mind. I've lived in the US my whole life; I never really thought a straight-forward pricing system was possible. Seriously. Then I remember getting kinda depressed, because the pricing system here (in the US) isn't going to change anytime soon. I recalled an article about Ticketmaster, which basically said that their system of showing the final price only at checkout, after a bunch of screens/clicks, is hugely profitable for them, almost everyone still purchases the tickets, regardless of the fees, because the process is so painful and there's really no alternative. Back to reality. Advertised ticket price = $100. Final price = $165. Ugh.

Full original

Community replies 0

No community replies yet. Add your perspective.

Replies from the source 6

Direct replies available in this import. Original-language excerpts.

US
user_7832HN

I don't think that's true. India for example has a ton of different taxes and until a few years ago the differences between states and different products were significant. Yet that didn't make it impossible, because everyone was already used to it.

Full original
RY
ryandrakeHN

You could solve this in two ways: 1. Allow companies to advertise a price exclusive of tax (but inclusive of fees) 2. Require companies to list a single total price where the final price the customer pays is less than or equal to. So their advertised price would be inclusive of the highest tax rate the customer would be required to pay. The oft-cited tax calculation "problem" is just an excuse.

Full original
LI
LiquidSkyHN

>With so many local taxing jurisdiction, it's essentially impossible. What is this nonsense? Businesses advertise "Widget is $PRICE + applicable tax". When you go to an individual store you pay ($PRICE + applicable tax). On the receipt it can show a breakdown of what that is. If that's hard to do on the backend for the business too fucking bad. Consumers should know exactly what they're going to be asked to pay upfront.

Full original
SY
SymbioteHN

"Prices shown for delivery to Denmark, click here to change delivery location." (based on GeoIP lookup, or a previous purchase if I'm logged in/cookied.)

Full original
LE
lesuoracHN

> With so many local taxing jurisdiction, it's essentially impossible. You can't honestly believe that only the US has different tax rates depending on which state/city you are in? Obviously it could be difficult but once the sale happens you need to know the final price. So if you can figure out when selling the good you can figure it out when advertising the good.

Full original
MG
mgkimsalHN

EDIT - (can't edit now). "Impossible" to have one single price that is applicable to every single potential buyer in all cases. Easiest example: if a computer is advertised as $2199 "including all taxes!" and a buyer who is tax exempt is buying... they wouldn't pay the $2199 advertised price (or... shouldn't).

Full original
Continue on Hacker News

Respect different perspectives. Share concrete experiences.

Sign in to post, reply, repost, and quote.