Stripe Adds Tax Compliance To Merchant Services Offer

TaxCloud has announced the launch of a new integration with Stripe.

The move means that users of Stripe’s payments platform can now connect to TaxCloud to manage their U.S. sales tax obligations via the company’s sales tax application programming interface (API).

Since the Supreme Court issued its opinion in South Dakota v. Wayfair last year, many online retailers now have to collect sales tax in additional states. The 5-4 decision in June 2018 essentially overturned the court’s 1992 ruling that states can collect sales taxes only from retailers that maintain a physical presence in those states. The 41 states that asked the Supreme Court to overturn that decision, Quill v. North Dakota, argued that it was “obsolete in an era of eCommerce.”

“Quill creates rather than resolves market distortions,” Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in the majority decision. “In effect, it is a judicially created tax shelter for businesses that limit their physical presence in a state but sell their goods and services to the state’s consumers, something that has become easier and more prevalent as technology has advanced. The rule also produces an incentive to avoid physical presence in multiple states, affecting development that might be efficient or desirable.”

To enable online retailers to better address this change, the TaxCloud API delivers real-time and batch process sales tax calculations for any address in the U.S., as well as automated registration, filing & remittance services, audit response and indemnification to its clients.

“TaxCloud is delighted to support retailers’ ability to be compliant with the changing sales tax landscape in the U.S. by integrating with leading eCommerce platforms,” TaxCloud CEO David Campbell said in a press release. “The payments process is the most logical place for sales tax services like TaxCloud’s to operate and this integration with Stripe is an important first step to achieving that vision.”

Within the past 18 months, TaxCloud has announced similar integrations with the Amazon Marketplace, Etsy, Shopify, Bonanza, QuickBooks Online, WooCommerce and eBay.