AbleCommerce Shopping Cart Software

My customers in Virginia pay 5% tax. I had an order yesterday for $211.74.

AbleCommerce calculated $10.58 in tax.

Virginia, like most but not all states, requires upwards rounding to the next 20 cents. So this purchase should have been treated like a $211.80, which means $10.59 is the correct tax amount.

Please explain what is happening here. These pennies will sure add up over time.

Thanks,
Brian

Iv never seen a state that rounds its taxes.

I called Virginia to re-ask the question.. the agent i talked to this time showed me an online form that shows Virginia uses standard rounding to the 2nd decimal. So it seem to me that Able is following the right methodology but messed up the rounding on this order. $211.74 * 0.05 = $10.5870, which rounds to $10.59, not $10.58.

Here is the transaction... It is complex because it contains both taxable products and non-taxable services, and it includes more than one warehouse. My suspicion is that Able is rounding in the wrong place... another possibility is that Able is using more digits during the calculation than what shows on the page? I don't know enough but I don't see how Able arrived at $10.58 unless they are truncating instead of rounding.

The items below marked -RW are in one warehouse, the other items are in a second warehouse. I put an asterisk next to the non-taxable service. If you total all the taxable products along with their coupons, you get $211.74.

*ecoenauditbund ecoAssessment + Energy Audit Bundle $549.00 1 $549.00
722868666289-RW Belkin Conserve 8 Outlets-RW $49.99 1 $49.99
077578051925 Deflector-Heat & Air $5.99 1 $5.99
855883000155-RW SmartStrip Surge Protector with cable wire-RW $30.95 1 $30.95
077578053326 Vent Cover-Magnetic 3 PAK $6.50 1 $6.50
635279355379 Greenlite CFL 20W Spiral Soft White $3.99 2 $7.98
635279352040 Greenlite CFL 16W Reflector R30 Indoor Soft White $7.99 2 $15.98
635279385109 Greenlite CFL 3-Way Spiral 20/11/26W Warm White $7.99 2 $15.98
635279240019 Greenlite CFL 23W R40 Dimmable Indoor Reflector Soft White $13.99 6 $83.94
635279397041 Greenlite CFL 26W Spiral Soft White $4.49 4 $17.96
Coupon Reuven Free Shipping With Service -$6.71 1 -$6.71
Coupon Reuven Free Shipping With Service -$10.89 1 -$10.89
Coupon Reuven Thank You - 10% Off Product Purchase -$8.10 1 -$8.10
Coupon Reuven Thank You - 10% Off Product Purchase -$15.43 1 -$15.43
Coupon $100 off ecoAsssessment, Home Energy Audit and Bundle -$100.00 1 -$100.00
Item Subtotal: $643.14
Shipping and Handling: $17.60
Tax: $10.58
Other: $0.00
Total: $671.32

The phantom penny has to do with multiple warehouses. Each warehouse is treated like a unique point of origin. Tax is calculated for each origin-destination pair. That results in a total tax that is less than what you expected.

We've attempted to make out tax calculator handle a majority of our customer needs, although it is difficult to perfectly handle every situation. Sometimes customers need a greater degree of accounting, accuracy, and/or compliance. An Avalara integration was done for AbleCommerce using our published Tax Provider API. A service like this might be an option for you.

I have spawned bug reports for this and for the other thread you noted about Maryland taxes and rounding. The issue with Maryland has a relatively easy solution. This one, not as easy to deal with.

Thanks Logan. I suspected as much on the warehouse issue and understand the complexity. I think we can live with it for the time being and get help like you suggested if need be.

On the Maryland issue, you say an easy fix... did you mean something I could do directly into the code, or do you mean easy like a good candidate to get into release 7.0.3 but the fix is still inside the black box kind of thing?

If i can adjust the code today for this, what should i do to resolve it?

Thanks,
Brian

bptoll123 wrote:On the Maryland issue, you say an easy fix... did you mean something I could do directly into the code, or do you mean easy like a good candidate to get into release 7.0.3 but the fix is still inside the black box kind of thing?

It's not in a place you can modify. I envision we could add a feature to the add/edit tax rule form that would let you specify the rounding rule. In my mind there are probably three to support: traditional rounding (round up on 5), bankers rounding (round 5 based on next digit), or always round up (like maryland). We could also support always round down, but I can't imagine any tax authority doing that.

So I meant for 7.0.3. I have already proposed the change.