Taxes and shipping are set up almost the same way in Ontraport. You create a rate once, add it to your order form, and use conditions to charge different amounts depending on where your customer is. Then you check what you've collected in your sales reports. Let's start with taxes.
First, a quick word of general advice. Whether you owe sales tax depends on what you sell, where your business is, and where your customers are. The rules vary a lot by location and change often, so check what applies to your business, or ask your accountant.
Open your order form's payment settings. On an Ontraport Page, hover over the order form block, click the gear icon, then choose Payment Settings. On an Ontraform, click Order form, then Payment settings.
Turn on the tax option, and a Taxes section appears. Click Add and pick a tax type from the dropdown. If you haven't made one yet, click New tax type at the top of the dropdown. Give it a name, which your customers will see on the form, enter the rate, and click Save. You can also create and manage tax types under Sales, then Settings, then Taxes, so you only set them up once.
If you charge tax only in some places, add a condition. Click Add under Conditions, then Add new condition, and choose a field, a condition and a value. For example, Billing State equal to California. Click Add new condition again to narrow it down, like by billing zip code, then click Save. Customers who don't match aren't charged that tax. Add as many tax types as you need, each with its own conditions.
One rule to remember: conditions can only use fields that are on your order form. So if a condition checks the billing state, make sure the form asks for it.
If you'd rather not manage rates yourself, connect Stripe Tax or TaxJar to calculate tax automatically from your customer's location. First, enter your business address under your profile icon, then Administration, then Business Info. Then go to Administration, then Integrations. For Stripe Tax, click Stripe connect and follow the wizard. For TaxJar, paste in your live token and click Save.
You can give each product a Stripe or TaxJar tax code so it's taxed correctly. Products without one use your default code.
On your order form, add the address fields and check Required field for the ones the tax service needs. In the US, that's country, state and zip code. In Canada, it's country and state. Everywhere else, it's just country.
Manual invoices use the same product setup as order forms. When you charge a card by hand, the tax service uses the location on the card. When you log an offline payment, Ontraport asks you for the location.
Now shipping. For every physical product you sell, turn on Add to shipping/packing slip, so each order gets a packing slip. The Fulfilling physical orders section covers packing slips and shipping in depth.
To charge for shipping, add a shipping type to your order form. If you don't have one yet, click New shipping type at the top of the dropdown, or go to Sales, then Settings, then Shipping methods. Name it, enter a price, and click Save. For example, Standard shipping for ten dollars.
Shipping conditions work just like tax conditions. Click Add under Conditions, then Add new condition. For example, Shipping State equal to California. Again, the field has to be on your order form. To save time, hover over any tax or shipping rule and click the copy button, then adjust the copy.
If you collect tax and charge for shipping on the same form, you'll find an option in the Taxes section to tax your shipping costs too. Turn it on if the rules where you sell require it.
To see what you've collected, go to Sales, then Reports. Taxes Collected breaks down every taxable transaction. Make a group for one tax name to see how many transactions it covers and the total tax paid, or group declined orders to spot taxed orders that are failing. Shipping Collected shows your shipping income, so you can check that your rates cover your real costs. It also shows refunds, and how often orders ship for free.
To keep a copy for your records, select the rows you want and click Export in the actions menu. Ontraport emails you a CSV file.
So: create your tax types and shipping methods, add them to your order form with conditions for each location, or let Stripe Tax or TaxJar handle tax for you, and check your totals in your sales reports. That wraps up taking payment. Next up: creating an order form.