Sales Tax..... but on what?

Okay, so I am writing out bills for my clients when I got into a discussion with my husband and a question came up that we both didn't know the answer to. How do you apply sales tax in photography? Do you apply it to the whole total of your time plus images, or just the images? How does that work with wedding packages when the time and pictures are combined into one?

My husband is calling our tax guy today to find out what he says but I was curious as to how you all did it. Living in WA, we have just incurred a 'destination sales tax', which means we base our sales tax on where our sales our ending up vs where I live. So, I have the amounts down, I just do not know exactly what I am supposed to apply the sales tax to.

Thanks for any help!

Well, I answered my own question by calling our local DOR and asking them. In Washington State, photographers tax on the total amount. All services and prints are subject to Sales Tax.

So, good to know!

Glad you posted the question and the answer, Chow! Being fellow 'tonian, I was interested in what you found out.
I'm sure it varies state to state.

I collect it on print and albums sales, as well as on a session fees. Pretty much any money I collect, I have to collect tax as well.

I'm in WI....

If I give something tangible to my client (cd, dvd, album), I tax them on the entire amount. This what I was told when I filed for my business license.

If I do a shoot and post everything online for the client to download electronically, then I don't tax.

I guess this logic resembles how I don't get taxed if I buy a song on iTunes.

I was about to post a topic about the exact same thing, I recently went into developing my own business as a travelling studio, where we hit up the smaller communities as well as this one because commercial space is very expensive, too expensive, and by doing this we can justify cheaper prices.

But where do you draw the line with sales tax? I don't mean to hijack your thread but the topic confunds me too, are we selling art? Or are we selling merchandise?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by ChowChi-Ching

Well, I answered my own question by calling our local DOR and asking them. In Washington State, photographers tax on the total amount. All services and prints are subject to Sales Tax.

So, good to know!

---

Glad you got your answers, I was late in seeing this.

I'm in Wa. State too. The only thing that doesn't have sales tax on it are my website sales. My prints come from a company out of Cali and they handle the sales. I pay income tax on the sales.