Sales Tax and Licenses Quick Guide
State Sales Tax
The State Sales Tax tab is used to decide which states OrderPort will calculate sales tax for. For each state you ship to, check the box to begin collecting sales tax. Each state will provide you with guidelines on the taxes that need to be collected.
OrderPort maintains a tax tool that received up to date information from each state. If a sales tax rate changes, the tool will automatically update.
State Licenses
This tab is where you will enter in licenses for each state you currently ship to. Click Add new Item to add a license. If you do not have a license listed for a specific state, OrderPort will not allow a shipping order to be created.
If 3rd party holds a license and ships for you, enter a placeholder license for each state that you have customers in.
When creating a new state license there is a field called Alcohol range. This field is intended to help restrict the shipping of spirits that tend to have high levels of alcohol. Both fields are optional. When provided, they are used to determine if an order can be shipped/not to that state.
The user can introduce just min, just max, or both. Whenever both fields are left empty, any level of alcohol can be shipped here. This means that if one bottle does not meet the alcohol criteria then the whole order can not be shipped.
Sales Tax Rules
This tab allows you to set up a sales tax rule. By default, OrderPort will charge a shipping customer tax based on destination A sales tax rule is used if you want to charge a customer sales tax based on the location of your winery instead.
If you need to set up a rule, click Add new rule. In the example at right, customers having orders shipped from Idaho to Illinois will pay the Idaho tax rate.
Tax Rates by Location
OrderPort’s sales tax tool regularly adjusts rates as they are changed by each state. It knows how to apportion the amount collected by state, county, and municipal jurisdictions. However, if your business prefers to hardcode your tax rates, you can do so on this tab. Click the Hardcoded toggle to Yes, then enter the tax rates you would like to collect for each category. Click Save Changes when you are done.
If your sales tax rates are hardcoded, your sales tax reports will not break down tax collected by each jurisdiction. It will only show the taxes collected as a single state-level total. You will need to calculate how much goes to the state, county, or local jurisdictions.
Liquor Stores
This tab is for shipping to licensed ABC liquor stores in the state of Alabama. Any wine shipments to a customer in Alabama must be delivered to a licensed store where it will be retrieved by the customer. When checking out the customer will choose one of the listed stores instead of entering their own shipping address. OrderPort has uploaded all current ABC stores into the system. If new stores become available, click Add Store and enter the required information.
If you currently ship to Alabama and do not have this tool enabled, contact OrderPort Support.
Sales Tax and Licenses Module
• For further information, contact the OrderPort Support team by phone at 206-464-1151 or by email at helpdesk@orderport.net