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Kansas Tax Issue

Submitted by jedispock on Thu, 08/07/2008 - 15:56
jedispock
Posts: 3
 Joined: 08/07/2008

I’ve been trying to find a way to correctly charge taxes for the state of Kansas. I’m not sure how it is like in other states, but here there is a state tax, county tax, and city tax. Thus, a person from McPherson, KS (county: McPherson; Zip code: 67460) will be charge 6.8% while another person who lives right outside the city limits of McPherson (same county and Zip code) will be charged 6.3%. Therefore, it seems to me that the only way to collect taxes correctly in Kansas is to compare the customer’s address to some database in order to find the proper tax rate. Has anyone else found a simply and easy solution to this problem? I would hate to have to reinvent the wheel…

I have already looked at the following:

Kansas Sales and Use Tax Address Tax Rate Locater Web services (http://www.ksrevenue.org/webservices.htm): their option is to use a WSDL

Thanks;
permalink #1 Thu, 08/07/2008 - 17:02
Ryan

Posts: 5269
 Joined: 08/07/2007
AdministratorHead Code Monkey - I eat bugs.

Eww... this sounds like it's going to require a custom module much like the Florida and Washington sales tax rules do. I don't know why these states do this to their residents and businesses. Sticking out tongue

Anyways, maybe you can get some pointers from the other modules, but stupid of KS to make this a SOAP thing. It should just work via POST to be as simple as possible.

permalink #2 Thu, 08/07/2008 - 17:21
Alaska
Posts: 364
 Joined: 10/16/2007

Would the use of an extend ZIP be of any use? i.e. not sure how fine grained it is and if it will separate the various tax areas.

permalink #3 Fri, 08/08/2008 - 08:25
jedispock
Posts: 3
 Joined: 08/07/2008

Ryan:

Thanks! Now I found the module for Florida, but I was not able to find the one for Washington. I did find the discussion of it in the forum. Do you have a link for the module for Washington as it seem to be the most promising for me?

Thanks again.

permalink #4 Fri, 08/08/2008 - 08:44
jedispock
Posts: 3
 Joined: 08/07/2008

Alaska:

Theoretically, it may be possible and useful. However, I don't think it would be that practical. I would have to download a 23 MB file (CSV) from Kansas Revenue's website, construct a database for all the different extended zip code address, create or edit a module that would incorporate this data, update the data quarterly, and finally force all customer's to find and enter four extra digits to their the zip code.

The alternative is for me to create a module that connects to their database and retrieves the necessary tax information that I need. That way, I don't have to recreate a database or update it every three months. On the downside, I will have to rely on someone's server for the site I creating to function.

One other possible solution, and I don't know if it is legal or not, is to create one tax rate for any order in Kansas. Of course, among other issues that would add extra work for the accounting department.

permalink #5 Fri, 08/08/2008 - 09:52
Ryan

Posts: 5269
 Joined: 08/07/2007
AdministratorHead Code Monkey - I eat bugs.

jedispock wrote:
Do you have a link for the module for Washington as it seem to be the most promising for me?

You know... now that I think about, I'm not sure this was ever released or releasable. You might try PMing TR here on the forums.

permalink #6 Fri, 08/08/2008 - 10:02
TR
Posts: 924
 Joined: 11/05/2007
Bug FinderFAQ ModeratorGetting busy with the Ubercode.

I'm out of town right now. I'll be releasing this next week when I get back. It should be very easy to modify the WA code to use a SOAP web service for Kansas.

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