thread Item (donation) had GST applied. Should be zero GST. Can I correct after a sale has been processed? in Payments Troubleshooting

Item (donation) had GST applied. Should be zero GST. Can I correct after a sale has been processed?

BEC-142 — Sun, 21 Sep 2025 07:49:54 GMT

Hi - we are a charity. We incorrectly put 10% GST on an item called a Donation. It should be zero GST. A handful of donations were processed. When running a report we can see these donations have attracted GST. It doesn't look like any of the donors requested a receipt as the Customer Name column in the Report is blank. However, I'd still like to amend this so it's reported accurately. Can I do this post sale?

Additionally, one item was recorded as a donation but it wasn't a donation.

Re: Item (donation) had GST applied. Should be zero GST. Can I correct after a sale has been proc...

Arie — Tue, 30 Aug 2022 01:16:59 GMT

Thanks for getting back in touch with us, @BEC-142 👋

Once a sale has been processed, it's not possible to change the tax settings or reports on these transactions. I understand your frustration not being able to amend this, and will pass your feedback on to our team for consideration.

If these weren't donations, and you had customer details you could consider issuing a refund and processing the sale again. For reference, a customer can be added to a sale after it has been processed - learn more here. You've mentioned that you've changed the settings on your items since, so you shouldn't run into this in the future!

The GST amount shown in your reports has not been deducted by Square, and is shown for your internal reporting purposes only. To view your total deposit amounts, and confirm that Square has not deducted this tax, follow these steps:

Go to Balance on your online Square Dashboard.
Use the date selector near the top-left corner to select a date range of your choice.
Click on the transfer you’d like to view.

Re: Item (donation) had GST applied. Should be zero GST. Can I correct after a sale has been process

BEC-142 — Tue, 30 Aug 2022 01:29:34 GMT

Thank you very much for your detailed reply.

Re: Item (donation) had GST applied. Should be zero GST. Can I correct after a sale has been proc...

BEC-142 — Tue, 30 Aug 2022 01:35:04 GMT

One additional question please Arie.

If a client taps to pay, we ask them if they'd like a receipt, if they say 'yes', then we ask for their email address which we then add into the Square payment. When I run a report on transactions, what column would show the client's email address if they did request a receipt?

Re: Item (donation) had GST applied. Should be zero GST. Can I correct after a sale has been proc...

Arie — Tue, 30 Aug 2022 02:08:45 GMT

Happy to clarify, @BEC-142!

The full email address or phone number a customer provides to receive their receipt isn't visible in reporting for data privacy reasons. Like this your customers (or you, making a purchase at another business using Square!) can provide their contact details for the purpose of receiving a receipt without having to worry about their email or phone number being used for marketing messages they haven't signed up to, for example.

There's still a way for you to run reports that show customer info, but you'll have to start manually adding customers to a sale. Here's how:

1. Open your Square app and tap More > Settings > Checkout.

2. Scroll to Customer Management and enable Add Customer During a Sale and/or Add Customer After a Sale.

When you process a sale next, this is where the Add Customer option will pop up:

The report that will show you your customer's name can be downloaded from Transactions > Export > Items Detail CSV.

Re: Item (donation) had GST applied. Should be zero GST. Can I correct after a sale has been proc...

BEC-142 — Tue, 30 Aug 2022 02:15:00 GMT

Ok thanks Arie. All makes sense.