Texans - Amazon charges sales tax effective 7/1/12.

Status
Not open for further replies.
jbcampb1

jbcampb1

CAGiversary!
An agreement has been met with the comptroller's office, so buy your stuff beforehand. I am unsure how this will affect pre-orders not yet charged; it won't be a question of whether tax will be collected but whether Amazon will pass the buck to the consumer. I would assume we will get shafted and pick up the SALT.

Sorry guys; capitalize while you can!
 
Upvote 0 Downvote
This is crap. I buy DVD's from Amazon.com and love the free shipping over $25 but now I have to pay tax too? Even Best Buy.com does this too for Texas residents.
 
[quote name='E_Man']This is crap. I buy DVD's from Amazon.com and love the free shipping over $25 but now I have to pay tax too? Even Best Buy.com does this too for Texas residents.[/QUOTE]

LOL. That's because Best Buy has a physical presence in Texas. Any retailer that has a physical presence in a state has to charge sales tax on online purchases.
 
So I guess I get to add the obligatory "You were supposed to have been paying sales taxes on all online purchases all along, you just weren't supposed to do it at the point of sale." By law, you should have kept track of all your purchases and then paid back the state along with your annual income taxes. So really, this is just your state getting better at collecting what it is owed, not creating a new tax or getting greedier.

Incidentally, just try buying a car over the internets to avoid taxes. Your state won't let you avoid paying the thousands in sales tax just because a dealership doesn't have a presence in your state. They'll hunt you down for what they are owed on the big purchases. You've been slipping by at Amazon because the state is too lazy to track down all the small purchases --- until now.
 
Wait, since Amazon is opening a warehouse over here in a city next door to mine, does that mean that they're going to have to start charging sales tax here in Indiana, too?

If so, I refer you to this.
 
Bah, I was looking to buying the Wii U on Amazon because of no tax. I already built my computer from buying stuff from Newegg and Amazon though.
 
[quote name='zshipp']So I guess I get to add the obligatory "You were supposed to have been paying sales taxes on all online purchases all along, you just weren't supposed to do it at the point of sale." By law, you should have kept track of all your purchases and then paid back the state along with your annual income taxes. So really, this is just your state getting better at collecting what it is owed, not creating a new tax or getting greedier.

Incidentally, just try buying a car over the internets to avoid taxes. Your state won't let you avoid paying the thousands in sales tax just because a dealership doesn't have a presence in your state. They'll hunt you down for what they are owed on the big purchases. You've been slipping by at Amazon because the state is too lazy to track down all the small purchases --- until now.[/QUOTE]

Yes the compliant person has been calculating state and local tax and remitting that quarterly to the comptroller's office. We don't have an individual income tax \\:D/ so no taxpayers purjered themselves by signing a fraudulent return and marking no. The state actually got access to flight logs and has been back looking at potential collection of sales tax on plane purchases made in Nevada and other sales-tax exempt states. Big collection there.

I'm not saying that the comptroller's office is wrong; with the franchise change they've actually collected much less than originally estimated and this will generate a lot of revenue for the state (the assessment was about $270 million.) I am just giving a heads up that we will no longer be required to make quarterly remittance on Amazon purchases. And I'll be switching to Newegg since I'm a big proponed of time value of money :)
 
[quote name='Deserter Goose']Wait, since Amazon is opening a warehouse over here in a city next door to mine, does that mean that they're going to have to start charging sales tax here in Indiana, too?

If so, I refer you to this.[/QUOTE]

As other states have fallen, so will yours my friend. Enjoy it while you can; it will probably change in the next 1-3 years.
 
[quote name='Calinks']Wait I'm supposed to be paying taxes on all online purchases?! LOL[/QUOTE]

Technically yes. Here in Missouri we can buy around $2000 from out-of-state vendors before we have to pay a "use tax" (except when there is a physical location in the state and\or for inventory purchases). This tax is equal to the state sales tax and it's the buyers responsibility to report the tax. I always found this tax legally questionable because you are being taxed by the state for items that are not in their jurisdiction. I understand why the state does this buy that in itself doesn't justify breaking the law for this purpose. It won't go away though because there are all sorts of laws passed every year that are technically not legal and nobody seems to care about fighting them.
 
[quote name='Clownzilla']Technically yes. Here in Missouri we can buy around $2000 from out-of-state vendors before we have to pay a "use tax" (except when there is a physical location in the state and\or for inventory purchases). This tax is equal to the state sales tax and it's the buyers responsibility to report the tax. I always found this tax legally questionable because you are being taxed by the state for items that are not in their jurisdiction. I understand why the state does this buy that in itself doesn't justify breaking the law for this purpose. It won't go away though because there are all sorts of laws passed every year that are technically not legal and nobody seems to care about fighting them.[/QUOTE]

It's part of the multi-state tax compact signed into effect a long time ago. It's part of inter-state commerce. Internet sales got away because there are general factors that establish "nexus" in a state are physical presence (such as the distribution center referenced above), having employees in the state, actively soliciting sales within the state, etc. Each state has different triggers as well.

Few companies have the capital to invest in legal fees to fight states on issues. It's long and involving; mainly the source of revoking laws is due to policital lobbying. Unfortunately the population as a whole is apthetic and it's part of the reason the US is in the condition it is now. If we were more informed and cared about how badly we were getting screwed over, it would be much better. Unfortunately, most people are too ill-informed or understand the ramifications.

Consider this: The current US deficit divided by household is the same as each household owning two brand new homes and not being able to live in them.

/rant
 
[quote name='killer9']welp taxes are in now it is so lame[/QUOTE]

newegg.com, jr.com are a couple of sites that don't charge tax yet.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
bread's done
Back
Top