thread Re: different tax amounts retail items and service items - can it be separated in Square in Orders, Menu Items, Catalog & Fulfilment

different tax amounts retail items and service items - can it be separated in Square

Jshayes — Sat, 20 Sep 2025 10:58:02 GMT

In the state of Missouri the retail items must but the service items does not need to be taxed, is there a way in the Square retail site that I can do this? Example - I do painting workshop and the price is around 35 dollars. But I need to only charge tax on 15 dollars of the price. I did find a thread asking a similar question but the best answers were from 2017 and 2020, in which case the answer was no, Square cannot separate tax amounts.

Re: different tax amounts retail items and service items - can it be separated in Square

Candlestore — Sun, 30 Apr 2023 21:49:04 GMT

@Jshayes ;

I had an idea but when I went to check my items that should not be taxed Like Food and Clothing Items, some Update turned my states taxes on for these items. Not sure when this changed but this could be a big problem for me. In the Items Creation Tab there was a spot called Taxes ---- It is still there and shows my State Sales Tax rate. I used to be able to select No Tax or something similar but now it shows My state rate cannot be turned off and is applied to ALL items. But because of some states asking for Multiple taxes I guess some update messed up my settings.

Anyway Thank you for asking this as now I found an issue I did not have before.

Re: different tax amounts retail items and service items - can it be separated in Square

Candlestore — Wed, 03 May 2023 22:03:02 GMT

@Jshayes

I was thinking of your example of $35 and $15 was taxed and the other $20 was not taxed.

You could create 2 items Retail product and the what ever the Service is that is non taxed.

then in the cart you just add those two items to your cart. You can leave the amounts blank if its 1 off type items and services that have variable pricing.

For example I make Signs but the person wants it Painted. For me I have to tax the entire thing as a sign. But lets Say you Charge $20 for the Sign and $15 to paint it (service).

Have Item Sign Sale price of $20 have this Item NO TAX

Paint Service sale Price $15 Tax turned on at whatever the tax rate is

Then when you charge the person Square will automatically only charge Tax on the $15.

You could also look at your Service fee as per hour charge, per foot etc and then you can enter a fee for the time or sizing of the item. So your Service could be painting at $5 per sqft..... then in the cart you put you painted 15 for the Service and Square takes 15x5 or $75 in your cart for the service.

You can also leave these Sale Price Blank, then when you enter the item in Square it will ask you for a Price, but still associate the Price with the Item or Service.

This is what I have been doing for my Fudge. The Fudge has no Sales Tax in PA, but when a person Buys a Candle, the candle is taxable. So Square can do it this way. I also saw now Square is looking into applying 2 different tax rates I believe but I do not know how that works yet but from my little digging into it you can have some Items at 3% others at 4% or others at the 3% and 4% rates. Since I do not need this I speed read it as I was trying to fix my Tax issue that I learned about trying to answer your Question the other day. Sorry it took time to get back to you.