Cannot display GST included price & GST amount separately in Invoice an checkput

KK02
Tourist
5 0 2

Hi Any Shopify experts who have managed their online store please advise how you have been able to do the following in Australia: I am told Shopify ONLY allows this for Shopify PLUS - is this true??

1. Have GST included price for Product display

2.Have GST amount shown separately on Invoice & 

3.Total to say (GST incl.)

Many thanks 

 

Replies 5 (5)
James_Hopkin
Shopify Partner
7 0 0

No one has replied to your question, so I will do a quick answer as this thread is getting shown for searches on Shopify and GST.

 

The problem
Shopify does not allow a tax included in a price to be removed for an overseas purchase. In Australia a reseller must show a price that includes tax. The simplest thing to do is to set your Shopify store to tax included in price. However if there is a sale outside of Australia, no GST is collected but the customer is charged. Many ecommerce platforms allow for tax to be removed from certain countries, it is a basic function. 

 

The solution
We modified our template with some code. Prices are ex GST in Shopify. Our template has been modified to add 10% to any price if the customer is located in Australia. Further modifications are required in the checkout. We have had to purchase IP data to make sure we are showing the right price to the right customer. 

It is not a perfect system and has flaws. Some customers mask ip. Some customers us a VPN. Some customers are located in Australia but their work uses USA ip addresses. Sometimes our code does not switch the price quick enough. 

When Shopify adds a new feature it can break our code. So with the recent update to discounts, we found we had to redo our code. 

 

The reality
Shopify has known about the issue for years. They are not going to fix it. If you are considering Shopify, and you are counting on a lot of ex tax sales DO NOT USE Shopify. It will break your heart. There are a lot of vendors and solutions out there, and none of them work 100%. You will be forever chasing poor conversion rates and broken code.

For most users, just use the built in Shopify system and charge overseas customers an extra 10%. You can discount shipping to make up for it, I think any overseas customer who buys from an Australian website is not concerned with an extra 10%. You are not breaking the law charging an overseas person 10% GST. They do not fall under Australian law. It is a grey zone if you say you collect 10% GST and do not send it to the government. I don't think you are breaking any laws, but I am not a lawyer and that was not tax or law advice. 

SimHar07
Tourist
3 0 0

Hey James, I know this is an old response but is this still the case? 

 

James_Hopkin
Shopify Partner
7 0 0
I believe this is no longer the case.
SimHar07
Tourist
3 0 0

Thank you for responding, Is there a setting to include tax in the product display pricing? If you could point me in the right direction it would be super helpful. 

James_Hopkin
Shopify Partner
7 0 0
There are a few areas in Settings to set up taxes. It is all very straight
forward, Shopify gives you all the notes and articles you need.

In Taxes and Duties we collect GST in Australia. We have selected prices
include GST.
No other country we collect taxes
We have selected the option "Include or exclude tax based on your
customer’s country"
This relates to Markets setting.

In Markets: select "Include or exclude tax based on your customer’s country"

If someone buys from outside of Australia then GST is removed from the
price. Everyone in Australia gets a price that includes GST.