How can I customize taxes for different products

Hello,

This is a good question.

I understand there is a special scenario for books in print format in Québec.

As a first step, you can go to WooCommerce > settings > tax. Look for the Additional tax classes field. Add a new class, for example, book rate. And make sure to save the settings.

Link to image: https://snipboard.io/sM1xRm.jpg

This will create a book rate rates section on your settings.

Link to image: https://snipboard.io/CnePqg.jpg

For this example, I am using 14%:

Link to image: https://snipboard.io/fet82I.jpg

At this point you can create a simple product, let’s say a book, be sure to add the book rate tax class.

Link to image: https://snipboard.io/WKoiIG.jpg

Add the product to your cart, then go to check out, add a shipping address located in Québec to make sure it works.

I hope this helps. Feel free to let us know if you have questions.

Thanks for your reply, Igor.

So, for this to work, I have to add 2 separate products for the same book :

1 Single for the printed format with the standard Federal Tax only
and
1 Variable for the ePub, PDF and Audio formats with the Book rate added to the standard Federal tax.

Correct?

Hello @pitaraj,

Hope you’re doing well!

You can create 2 products, but the whole point here is with applying an exclusive tax rate for the e-book.

So you can have one product named “book” and give it 2 variants, the physical and e-book but apply said tax rate only to the downloadable variant.

Link to image: https://i.imgur.com/8LBXmCI.png

To learn more about tax classes, you can check the following guide: https://woocommerce.com/document/setting-up-taxes-in-woocommerce/

Hope this helps!

Thanks for your reply.

That’s exactly what I need.

Have a nice day.

Actually, for some reason, this does not work.

Let me try to put this as simple as possible.

eBook:
Tax1 (GST) applies to ALL provinces in Canada
Tax2 (PST) applies ONLY in Quebec

Physical book:
Tax1 (GST) applies to ALL provinces in Canada
Tax2 (PST) does NOT apply in Quebec nor anywhere else

If I define Tax1 (CA * 5% GST) and Tax2 (CA QC 9% PST) as Standard,
it works fine with eBook, but Tax2 is then also applied to Physical book in QC, which we don’t want.

If I define only Tax1 (CA * 5% GST) as Standard
I can apply Standard to the Physical book variant of my variable product and it works fine.

If I then create a New Class Rate for Tax2 (CA QC 9% PST) and apply it to the eBook variant of my variable product, even though I make it a Compound tax (as also Standard Tax1) and give it a Rank 2, Tax1 is not taken into account. Only Tax2 appears in my basket.

Doesn’t compound mean that my basket should show both taxes (Standard Tax1 + New Class Tax2)?

Hi @pitaraj

If I then create a New Class Rate for Tax2 (CA QC 9% PST) and apply it to the eBook variant of my variable product, even though I make it a Compound tax (as also Standard Tax1) and give it a Rank 2, Tax1 is not taken into account. Only Tax2 appears in my basket.

For us to understand your scenario properly, could you please provide us the screenshot of the following:

– Tax Settings
– Tax Classes
– Products Settings

If you don’t already have a screenshot service installed, you can try https://snipboard.io or https://skitch.com/. You can share the direct link to the image as a response to this topic.

Wishing to make progress on this issue and to find a workable solution, I pushed my research further and came to understand that it is not possible to assign 2 tax classes to any given product in order to manage exceptions.

Since books in any format other than print (paper) are taxable throughout Canada, I defined the Standard class as:
CA * 5.0000% “GST Digital” Priority 1
CA QC 9.9750% “PST Digital” Priority 2

Since physical books are subject to GST everywhere in Canada, but exempt from PST in Quebec, I then defined a special class for physical books as:
CA * 5.0000% “GST Print” Priority 1 Shipping taxable

I will run further tests, but so far it seems to work fine.

The only drawback to that method is that if someone buys a combination of physical and digital products, two separate amounts appear for GST on the order form: “GST Print” for the physical books, and “GST Digital” for eBooks. This is an unusual way to present taxes, but I think I can live with that, and customers should not mind.

Awesome @pitaraj glad you able to sort it out, if you have any further questions, please open a new ticket.

Cheers!