When you first got that wild hair to be an event manager and began plotting your endurance race empire, did your stratagems include a plan to deal with taxes? We’re willing to bet it didn’t. It doesn’t for most! Taxes are usually filed away in your brain with other fun things like “dinner with the in-laws” and “painting the garage.”
In ‘Merica, 45 states collect statewide sales tax. So, unless you’re doing business in Alaska, Delaware, Montana, New Hampshire, or Oregon, it’s time to address the issue of how to incorporate sales tax into your registration fees. Many registration platforms don’t have a solution for this, so it’s important to check on that with your registration provider. If you’re a ChronoTrack Live customer, there is an easy fix, but let’s address a few other questions first:
Does Sales Tax Apply To Your Event?
In general, any retail sale is taxed. The common definition of “retail” is tangible property or sales of services or activities (the last bit is where events come in). So, yes, this most likely applies to your event if you’re doing business in one of the 45 states that impose sales tax.
That being said, many states allow tax exemptions for certain products or services, or for specific purchasers. For example, 501(c)(3) charities are exempt from taxes. Ultimately, it’s your responsibility as a business/event owner to figure out if you should be adding any state-mandated sales taxes to your registration fees (as well as merchandise).
Who Can You Contact For Help
If you’re not sure whether you need to charge sales tax, or what rate you should be charging, contact an accountant or your state department of revenue. Here’s some good, high-level info on taxes, too.
How to Incorporate Sales Tax in ChronoTrack Live
If you’re a ChronoTrack Live user, there’s an easy way to incorporate state sales taxes into registration fees with the use of custom fees. This feature allows you to apply an extra fee to all or some new athlete registrations. This can be applied for state sales tax and things such as product shipping (or really anything else).
If you’d like to set up a custom fee in your registration system, the first step is to contact your RSM or ChronoTrack Registration Support to enable this function. We have to “switch it on” behind the scenes, but it doesn’t take more than a minute. Once enabled, follow these step-by-step instructions on how to set up a custom fee.
Pretty awesome, right? We’re really happy to offer this to our customers because we know what a hassle it can be to MacGyver a work-around for a custom fee in a registration system that does not offer it. If you want to learn more about the custom fees feature or have any questions, drop us a line.
