Quiz: You've got a Website in Dallas, Texas, that sells, let's say, pipe fittings. You sell a dozen of them to a guy in Harvest, Alabama, and a computer in Louisville, Kentucky, handles the transaction. The sale is worth $230. How much tax do you pay, and to whom?
Answer: I don't know. In fact, most people, including tax professionals, don't know. Most of the time they make an educated guess based on conventional commercial transactions and hope for the best. If that sounds like a recipe for an eventual IRS audit, then fret no more, help has arrived.
The RIA Group (Research Institute of America), a New York-based provider of technology and information to accounting, tax and corporate finance professionals, has announced the release of the most comprehensive and authoritative guide to Federal, international and state taxation and international transactions. The title is Electronic Commerce: Taxation and Planning.
According to the author, David E. Hardesty, the manner in which taxation is handled can make the difference between success and failure in the volatile world of E-commerce. A too-conservative approach by a business could result in paying too much tax and losing a competitive edge, while an aggressive approach could lead to underpayment and penalties.
Electronic Commerce: Taxation and Planning provides the answers to questions like the one posed above, as well as planning strategies that will be useful not only to tax and accounting professionals, but also to anyone engaging in electronic commerce. It's also available in both print and Web-accessed editions. For more information on that, visit the Website of the RIA Group's corporate parent, The Thompson Corporation, at www.thomcorp.com.
Among the relevant matters addressed are:
The rules for multi-state income and sales tax as they apply to E-commerce. \nThe rules for determining how international electronic commerce should be taxed. \nUnique compliance issues for multi-state or multinational E-commerce enterprises. \nHow electronic commerce affects the ability of tax authorities to enforce tax compliance.
