Best practices for when, under rare circumstances, a sales tax rate change DOES apply to existing layaways.

Sales Tax Rates and Layaways

In rare circumstances a sales tax rate change DOES apply to existing layaways.

In the Edge, Sales tax is set and stored at the receipt level when a customer puts a layaway on deposit.

To change that rate on file with all the nuances of taxation would be an enormous programming undertaking, and also may not be legal, or would likely cause confusion to the customer.

The customer has a factual and historical receipt showing a tax and an amount due at pickup. In most cases when a tax rate changes, the contracted rate remains in affect for layaways (contracted sales) and the new tax rate is in affect for sales such as special orders, repairs, custom and of course new sales.

If a NEW Tax Rate Applies to Existing Layaways

The best advice we could give you would be first, be certain that the new tax rate is in fact the right tax rate for the old layaways. If it is, then we recommend you do the following.

1. Cancel each pending layaway and print the cancel receipt.
2. Place any deposits on Credit Memo (so you can easily re-apply them).
3. Re-enter the layaway intake using the NEW sales tax and print the receipt.
4. Apply the credit memo as the deposit.
5. Staple the return and new layaway receipts together.
6. You may want to alert the customers that the transaction was re-run and that new receipts would be available when they come in.