Friday, April 26, 2013

Sales Tax and Online Selling

I don't know where journalists got the idea sales tax wasn't charged online if it was required in the state the business was located. I sold online for eleven years and reported each quarter Florida Sales Tax and sent it to the state. In other states outside of Florida, if the state required sales tax the buyer was to account and pay to their state. Government is this big mammoth, slow moving entity that is lazy and didn't have the infrastructure in place to collect revenue from online sites. Again, it was the technology out pacing the enforcement of tax laws.
I just closed down all retail stores online because the sales fell to almost nothing beginning in 2008. The reasons I think caused this fall was the demise of the middle class, loss of jobs in my target market,hackers that caused problems in credit card use online, and the high fees of third party brokers like PayPal.
Ebay,Amazon,Shopzilla,Etsy,etc. sell dreams of grandeur to their potential small business sellers.Their stock is great.Shipping became a huge problem.As the use went down for first class mail, shipping costs went up.Fees, and account "maintenance" charges became unsustainable for the small online business owner.
Re-inventing yourself is the key to success.Vision into the future is a necessary tool.It is a balancing act for the entrepreneur of today to continuously change focus.

Read more at Jacksonville.com: http://jacksonville.com/associated-press/2013-04-26/story/tax-free-internet-shopping-jeopardy#comment-710872#ixzz2Raafh1rm

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