Sales tax is more complicated for Amazon FBA sellers than most retailers. Because even with Amazon taking care of things, you’re still responsible for these four liabilities on your Amazon sales.
If you have a physical presence or sufficient economic presence in a state, you’ll have nexus there. And when you have nexus in state, you have to collect and remit sales tax on transactions there.
For Amazon sellers, however, things are a little more complicated. Amazon is required to collect state sales tax for their Fulfilled by Amazon (FBA) sellers in every state with marketplace facilitator laws. And a majority of states have these rules in place.
Amazon defines its responsibility the following way:
“Amazon calculates, collects, and remits tax on sales made by merchants shipped to customers located in the states that have enacted Marketplace Facilitator, Marketplace Fairness, or similar law.”
Put simply, if you make sales through Amazon in these states, Amazon handles your sales tax there.
That said, Amazon handling your sales tax is not a free pass. There’s a lot of responsibility you still have. Here are four things you can’t afford to overlook.
While a majority of states have passed their own facilitator laws in the last few years, there are a number that haven’t. Amazon sellers are responsible for sales tax on all transactions in that state.
As of April 2020, the following states don’t have facilitator laws:
(Alaska, Delaware, New Hampshire and Oregon don’t have facilitator laws, but that’s because they don’t have sales tax.)
If you sell on Amazon in any of these states, you – not Amazon – have sales tax liability there.
If you sell through Amazon in a state with marketplace facilitator laws, Amazon took care of your sales tax liability for you on those transactions. But the states won’t know that until you prove it to them.
Some states require you to request and maintain exemption certificates if a marketplace facilitator manages your sales tax on their platform. Failure to do so can lead to devastating penalties.
Exemption certificates are especially important during state audits. If you neglect to collect them now, you could face serious consequences a few years in the future.
Many cities and municipalities charge sales tax. But Amazon is only responsible for state sales tax. They won’t help you with your local sales tax liability. That means, even on transactions for which Amazon took care of the state taxes, you might have to calculate, collect and remit local taxes.
Local sales tax rates and laws vary significantly. Dealing with this liability can be unmanageable without a dedicated team or system in place.
One way of establishing physical nexus in a state is to store inventory there.
In certain situations, Amazon fulfillment centers may store your inventory in states you don’t sell in. This would create tax liability for all of your sales in that state – even if they aren’t through Amazon.
This can drastically expand your liability, so it’s important to keep track of it.
It’s worth noting that some states like New York do offer exemptions to this.
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