Is there a way to create a post-tax discount?

[ARDG]

We're looking to accept a credit voucher from a 3rd party, but want the person redeeming the voucher to pay tax on the full amount.

[#2]

Hello! While I can definitely understand how this feature could be useful in a number of scenarios, our discounts are currently only able to be applied before taxes. 

I'll be sure to share your feedback with our Product team!

PS) If my answer solved your problem, would you mind marking it as "Best Answer"? That'll help the rest of the community find what they're looking for. If not, just write back, and I'll continue to help. Thanks!

[sk8judge]

I pay sales tax when I buy my product from the vendor. I am taxed at my state sales tax rate on that product. 

If I charge sales tax first and then the discount, I am recouping the tax that I paid and still saving the customer money by giving them the discount. BTW...I don't charge for shipping as a service to my customers.

[ACAcatering]

Bare with me as I try to wrap my head around this.  So you are choosing to pay sales tax to your vendor, correct?  I've always known the product I sell to be tax exemptable when I purchase it from a vendor.  Otherwise you end up paying sales tax twice.  Once to your vendor for the product and then what you are required to pay in from your sale (unless you are selling to a tax exempt entity).  Now, I have known companies that elect to pay the sales tax on their resale items for a bigger write off, but that's a different story for a different day.  In my opinion it would be easier for you to request a tax exemption from your vendor.  Technically that would be the right way to do it.
I guess my next question would be, are you still paying the state the tax owed from your sale?

[jthorvaldson]

I need to be able to set up a non-taxed discount so we can account for some promotions we do with donations. We give them a paper certificate that works like a gift card (but it isn't an actual gift card). So if the certificate is for $100.00, I need the discount to work like a gift card in that it takes $100 off the balance due for the order, but doesn't affect sales tax for the order. Has anyone been able to handle something like this in Square? I don't want to process it as tender, because it is more like a discount on the order, not actual tender.

[Helen]

Hello @jthorvaldson!

I've merged your post into this thread where we're tracking this feature request. At this time taxes are calculated after the discount is applied, so there isn't a way to process the sale without affecting the tax. One our our SuperSellers, @ACAcatering, shared a workaround in this thread too. I hope that helps in the meanitme! 

[Moodyales]

Hello,

I'd like to echo the need for a post-tax discount. We need to pay sales tax on the sale of our product even if we give it away (it's liquor so has specific rules). And we also need to pay sales tax on in-kind donations/giveaways which is quite a frequent occurence, so right now it is extremely manual and time-consuming to make sure our accounting software is calculating the correct tax liability. The current process is to ring it in in Square, then print out the receipt, void it and enter it manually into our accounting software. There has to be a better way....

Thanks,

James

[IndigoSkin]

This kindof goes with the question I have going right now. When I have taxable items and  non-taxable services rendered and a discount is applied , the discount is portionally applied across the whole transaction -  This is not what I am looking to do... I would like to be able to discount ONLY taxable items sales, not my services. I am going to tag you and cross post  @Helen.

[GlassJudy]

We've struggled with this too, and finally came up with a, not great, but acceptable solution.  When we want to discount post-tax, we'll do a Split Ticket payment and apply an Other payment type, which allows for a note to be entered.  When this "discount" is applied in this way, it comes off after sales tax and almost everyone is happy.  It's a little kludgy, but it works.

Here's the bottom of a recent receipt where a customer used an existing credit.  Her credit completely covered the total cost, so we didn't have to do the Split Ticket thing, but we still entered the discount as an Other receipt, and added a note so we know that no money was received:

This may not work well as-is if you're exporting your sales to a bookkeeping program, but with minor adjustments I think it could.  I manually enter our sales into Quick Books, so I can make any necessary adjustments at that time.  In this case, when I enter the sale, I'll put the $6.07 against her existing credit.

[TupperNicole]

I’m looking for this too! I’m a DS consultant & choose to use Square to invoice my clients instead of PayPal as I find it more professional looking. However, when I offer personal discounts, i.e. 15% off one product, which comes out of my personal commission, I’m unable to adjust for the 6% tax on that discount, which I pay to the DS company, so now I’m down 6% more - making that 21% I’ve lost on that sale... unless I do a $$ off amount - and not every customer can equate the $$ off amount to a % when I have told them I will give them a % off! I run discount campaigns often to generate sales & gain new customers. Hey Square, please fix this quickly - looks like your customers have been asking for this for 3 years???

[Mrbbqguy]

6 pages of replies and questions over severaL years and square does nothing. How hard is this to fix?  Must be monumental. 

[MichaelAnn]

@TupperNicole has described my exact situation.  I try to jockey the numbers so that the invoice total takes all of this into consideration but it is a clunky and time-consuming workaround, especially when you have multiple orders to adjust and frustrating when you are trying to make these adjustments in a crowd setting.