[RetailEdge Moderator]

To change the sales tax for a state sales tax holiday (Vermont has one coming this weekend), you should setup a new Sales Tax Jurisdication. Vermont's has one coming up on August 22, 2009 and March 6, 2010. The technical bulletin describing this Sales Tax Holiday can be found at the following link:

http://www.state.vt.us/tax/pdf.word.exc ... b/TB46.pdf

This sales tax holiday includes sales of items of tangible personal property costing $2,000.00 or less that would otherwise be subject to
sales and use tax will be exempt from sales tax and local option sales tax on the Sales Tax Holiday. The items must be purchased for personal use.

To set this up in RetailEdge you would

1. choose Tax Jurisdictions from the Tools menu
2. Press the Add button to create a new sales tax jurisdiction.
3. Call the Jurisdiction Name anything you want (e.g., VT Sales Tax Holiday) with a base Rate of 0%.
4. Add an exemption. One exemption might be a Stock Type Exemption for Stock Type Stock. The Rate Should be 0%. Enable 2-Tiered Tax Rate with a Exemption Limit of $2000.01 (since the limit is >= and the tax holiday is for sales > $2000 . Select Calculate the tax on the Total item price.
5. Press Save to save your changes.

You can continue this process until you have added all the exception types you need. For instance you might want to have another exception for the rental stock type or particular department. You might also need to have a second similar Tax Holiday tax for a local option tax depending on your location.

Once you are finished creating the new tax jurisdictions, you will need to change the tax for the location. To do this, edit your location (Tools|Settings|Locations) and Edit the Default Sales Tax Jurisdiction for the Location on the Misc Tab. You will need to apply the new sales tax jurisdictions on the day of the Sales Tax Holiday and then back again the following day.

MAKE SURE YOU TEST THESE BEFORE THE DAY OF THE SALES TAX HOLIDAY. When you are working with exceptions you want to make sure that it works as anticipated. It can be confusing and there is an order to the way they are applied.

You should read the bulletin referenced above. This may also effect how you create and apply sales tax. For instance, with the Vermont Sales Tax Holiday:

1. The items must be purchased for personal use.
2. Businesses and business entities such as sole proprietorships, partnerships and corporations are not eligible for the exemption. (But some of these might have a tax exempt ID and eligible anyway.)
3. Amusement charges including season passes for ski resorts are not eligible.
4. Charges for telecommunication services including prepaid telephone cards are not eligible.
5. Charges for cable television services are not eligible.
6. Digital downloads of music, movies and books are not eligible.
7. A bundled sale of several items offered for sale at a single price will qualify for the exemption if the
total price of the package is $2,000.00 or less. You should be careful here as RetailEdge package items are not truly bundled. So the tax might be stripped from these items when it should not be.
8. Discounts given by the vendor that reduce the selling price of the item can be used to determine if an
item falls below the threshold for the Sales Tax Holiday. (this will work with the Sales Tax jurisdictions setup above).
9. Rentals of tangible personal property qualify for the exemption if the rental occurs on the Sales Tax Holiday. (So adding a Exception for Rental Stock Type as above may apply depending on your business.)
10. When a customer purchases an item of eligible property on the Sales Tax Holiday, but later exchanges the item for a similar eligible item no sales tax is due even if the exchange is made after the Sales Tax Holiday ends. If you find the original sale in the Sales Manager then you Copy the Sale into the sales screen, RetailEdge will ask if you want to apply the original sales tax jurisdiction to the new sale. In this case you would say yes.
11. Layaways qualify if final payment for the layaway sale is made on the Sales Tax Holiday and the customer takes possession of the item on the Sales Tax Holiday. RetailEdge will ask if you want to apply the original sales tax jurisdiction to the new sale when applying final payment. In this case you would say No, so that the sale would pick up the Sales Tax Holiday sales tax jurisdiction for the sale.
12. Back ordered items must be paid for in full on the Sales Tax Holiday to be exempt. So if you take a deposit for 100% of the sale, you will need to make sure that when the question about using the original sales tax for the sale when you convert the deposit to a sale you say Yes. This would be necessary if you are using RetailEdge's Open Order mechanism to track outstanding back orders.

Be careful if you have a number of non-entered items that are sold. You will need to setup a department exception so that when the items are sold the Sales Tax Holiday exceptions are handled properly.

It is a fairly simple process if you are just selling items. However, it can get complicated because of the rules if you are using some of the features like Open Orders, Layaways, Exchanging items after the fact, etc. So you should be careful when using these functions during a sales tax holiday and check the bulletins provided by the State.