Washington State Destination Sales Tax API

[techdog]

Has anyone found a good solution for the destination based sales tax? I just tried to go to the destinationtax.com site and it appears to be down. Is there anything out there that connects to the Washington State Destination Sales Tax and is consistently updated without having to make changes quarterly?

[caseystrom]

The best method I have come up with is using geocoding for the latitude and longitude rather than the zip code. According to DOR, the zip code (and plus 4) is not 100% fool proof as new construction sometimes wont get updated in the DOR's database in a timely fashion.

1. Use a geocoding service to convert address to Lat/Lon. Google Maps allows 1000 queries per day and is pretty accurate.
2. Use Lat/Lon against the DOR HTTP response API - dor.wa.gov/Content/FindTaxesAndRates/RetailSalesTax/DestinationBased/LatLongInterface.aspx

Voila. Tax code generated.

[patternman]

Hello,
A new year and new quarter are upon us.
Time for me to see what's new on the sales tax.

Just wondering if there is a mod available?

It would be nice to not have to keep my own database of tax rates and zip codes.

Thank you.

[Bonkycat]

The best method I have come up with is using geocoding for the latitude and longitude rather than the zip code. According to DOR, the zip code (and plus 4) is not 100% fool proof as new construction sometimes wont get updated in the DOR's database in a timely fashion.

1. Use a geocoding service to convert address to Lat/Lon. Google Maps allows 1000 queries per day and is pretty accurate.
2. Use Lat/Lon against the DOR HTTP response API - dor.wa.gov/Content/FindTaxesAndRates/RetailSalesTax/DestinationBased/LatLongInterface.aspx

Voila. Tax code generated.

Hi caseystrom,

Any detailed instructions you can supply? I do see the WA state dor would like us to use the lat/lon (ridiculous!) If your fix is easier than patternman's fix in the local tax mod thread, I am interested.

Thanks,

Lisa

[Bonkycat]

Until someone shares or creates the mod to use the WA state API, patternman posted a great alternative in this thread:

http://www.zen-cart.com/forum/showth...180#post908180

I added to that by making all 60k+ local tax records available to import directly to your tax_rates_local table.

To download the files click here:
http://www.gemni-gems.com/sql.zip

For the other options to this process, refer to page 34 of the thread posted above.

Good luck all! And if anyone has a better, faster way, please share.