Save the Tax Event – How to Discount Properly?

[Allie_POH]

We'd like to offer tax-free shopping in store and online for an upcoming event.

How do we create a discount code that removes exactly the HST applied to the initial item in the cart?   If we do a post-tax discount code it will remove the HST and then some.

Would also appreciate knowing how to do this from the square terminal – I know we can just switch off the HST on a per-item basis, but to properly account for the discount and still remit our taxes properly I'm wondering how we go about this?  Thanks!

[LoveNorth]

Would it not just be a pre-tax discount of the HST % amount?

[Allie_POH]

Not quite –  we're in Ontario and charging HST @ 13%.  So, on a $10 item, the pre-tax discount makes it $8.70.  But $8.70 plus HST is $9.83.

I'm trying to keep things straightforward, and have it check out at exactly the pre-tax sticker price.  It's not a big deal for smaller items, but we sell a lot of larger stuff as well and the cumulative loss might really add up.

I'm trying to avoid doing back-of-the-napkin math for in-store purchases, and I'm not sure if there's a way to have this work properly with a coupon for online checkout.  You'd think Square could do the discount calculations automatically somehow based on your tax rate, but I haven't been able to figure that out yet.

[LoveNorth · Accepted solution]

Thanks for explaining this. I guess I did not quite understand what save-the-tax discuss really was so this really helps. 

How about the "include tax in price" function? This item is $8 and this is what the checkout screen shows.

This means customers from different tax areas are give different amount of discount automatically.

https://squareup.com/help/ca/en/article/6878-all-about-taxes-square-online-store

[Allie_POH]

Ooh, this could be just what I need, thanks!  I can toggle this on for the weekend sale and I think it should do what I need it to do 😉