California Sales Tax Zone Mods/Info

[mjc]

To all,
-I needed to charge the correct sales tax for all the California Counties and the extra City taxes.
-I read some threads on how to set up Counties as tax zones. I found the following:
Well, I went over the edge yesterday and worked on putting the 80+ counties in Ohio in my Zen Cart. It appears to have worked! I am so pleased. Every one from Williams to Ashtabula is in there. I found out how to do it from the forum here but there (of course) is a catch. You follow the model from New York Sales Tax. NY put this (dreadful) tax into effect last year and since then Zen Cart has been responding. One couple wrote in and said to :
Create a zone for each of the counties/cities
create tax zones for each tax rate
create a zone definitions for each tax zone
Remove your state as a state by itself and replace with your state and your county.
Maybe the Zen Cart had changed slightly from that recipe so you had to do things in a slightly different order. Here is what I found:

So creating a zone is easy for each county but you have to keep each of the codes as OH (or whatever state you are doing). Otherwise the customer's address will be whatever code you put in and the post office won't deliver the package unless it has the proper state name. So Ashtabula County still has to be OH.

You have to set up the Zone Definitions next. This is when you set up the tax levels (6% sales tax, 6.25% sales tax, etc.).

Then you have to take each of the above tax rates, go to "Details" , choose "Insert" and put in each county at their level. So Ashtabula has to be defined as a 6.5% sales tax state, etc.

Then you have to define tax rates (drop down menu) you have to input the different levels again-->New Rate--->Taxable goods--->Zone--->The Rate (with no % just the numbers like "6.5")--> Description that you want your clients to see like "Your taxation without representation" or "Sales tax for your county 6.5%"). Do not fill in the priority area.

So, that's what I did and it seems to work. I can be from Cincinnati and "buy" something on my site and have it shipped to Williams county and get charged 7% sales tax which is what should happen.

If I am wrong about this in any way, please let me know.
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-I go to the Calif. BOE and download the tax tables, but sorting out the information needed to be done, such as: Assigning a specific tax to each County and then determining the specific City tax so as not to have duplicate taxation when setting up County and City zones.
-The end result is is that I am setting up zones for the Counties and then Zones for the Cities. When a purchase is made, the Sales tax will be computed by County and, if the purchase address is in a specified City Zone, the City zone tax will be added.
-To do this, I had to break down the separate County and City taxes.-The attached file does this.
-I hope it helps...

[mjc]

Updated the spreadsheet.

[mjc]

I found this: it is much clearer to understand:

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I set up the WI zones without the use of the mod.
To set up the counties first back up your database, that way if you make any mistakes you can always restore from the backup.
Next in the Admin goto Locations/Taxes -> Zones.
Find the zone for Florida and delete it.
Next, create one new zone for each county in Florida.
Example:
Zone Name: Florida - Jackson Co
Zone Code: FL - JACKSON
Country: United States

After you have added all the counties to the zones goto zone definitions.
You now need to create a zone definition for each county. If there are any definitions already in there, delete them and their details. Then add the new ones.
Example:
Zone Name: Florida Jackson Co
Description: FL - Jackson Co Sales Tax
After you have created the definition for the county you need to add the details for that zone definition.
Select the zone definition for for the county you just added(for this example its Jackson Co), and click the DETAILS button.
You should see a blank page with 2 buttons on the far right. Click the insert button.
Add the details.
Example:
Country: United States
Zone: Florida - Jackson Co.
(This is the part that gets confusing because you aren't just creating the zone definition but also adding the details for each definition).
Ok so know you have zones and zone definitions for each county in Florida.
You should already have a tax class for taxable goods created, if not then you need to create a new tax class for taxable goods.
Finally, you have to create a tax rate for each county.
(Delete whatever is already in there just to be sure you don't have any unwanted tax rates in there.)
Under Locations/Taxes and Tax Rates, click the NEW TAX RATE button.
Add the tax rate info for each county.
Example:
Tax Class Title: Taxable Goods
Zone:Florida - Jackson Co
Tax Rate: (Whatever the tax rate is for Jackson Co)
Description: FL - Jackson Co Sales Tax
Priority: 1


Now in order for this to really work you have to turn on the states pull down list.
Admin--> Configuration --> Cutstomer Details --> State - Always display as pull down = True

Once you have added everything, when someone goes to register they will no longer be able to just select "Florida" as their state. Instead they will have to select Florida - Jackson Co or Florida - Marion Co... etc.

I hope this makes some kind of sense. Its a long process so go slow and back up before you start.