As commercial printers begin to expand their marketing to online sales, it is important to consider the requirements for collecting sales tax on sales to customers who reside in the states for which the printer has a physical presence (called a Nexus).
This article is an attempt to provide resources to help answer sales tax collection questions.
Well to start with you have to determine in which states you have what is determined to be a "Nexus". One of the recent changes that many states - specially New York - have made, or are considering, is in the determination of Nexus. Amazon.com and the state of New York have been in a constant battle over the recent changes in law where New York is basically stating that if your company has "affiliate sales" (people living in the sate with reference links back to your site and collecting commissions on these links) - then you have a Nexus in New York and are required to collect sales tax.
Once you have determined your Nexus states then you need to figure out what the sales tax requirements are.
If you are lucky enough to only have a nexus in these states; Delaware, Montana, New Hampshire, Oregon. Then you currenlty don't have any sales tax collection obligation.
If you are in Alaska then you may also not have any tax collection obligation except for a few municipalities.
The next simplest states are these that only levey a state wide sales tax: Connecticut, Idaho, Indiana, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Maryland, Maine, Michigan, Mississippi, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia.
These states have a state wide and county sales tax: Florida, Hawaii, Nevada, North Carolina, Ohio, Wisconsin, Wyoming.
These are the most difficult as these have state wide, county, and local municipality sales tax obligations: Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Georgia, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, New Mexico, New York, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont.
In most all cases products will be taxable. Certain services may or may not be taxable depending on your state law. Here is a site that may be able to provide you with the exact answer to this question:
http://www.taxadmin.org/fta/pub/services/online/default_07.html
To help answer specific questions about taxes for your location or industry here are some links that may be helpful.
http://salestax.wordpress.com/us-sales-tax-rates/
This site provides links to sales tax information for all states. It is also a very good resource for determing what rules and regulations might apply to your company.
http://www.zip2tax.com/
http://thestc.com/
http://www.strikeiron.com/Catalog/ProductDetail.aspx?pv=2.0.0&pn=Online%20Sales%20Tax%20Calculation
These sites provide a lookup service for determing what tax rates apply for each zipcode.
http://www.salestaxinstitute.com/
This site provides some of the most up to date news about tax laws and articles. The informaiton page defines sales tax terms important to companies, such as "Nexus".
http://salestaxbuzz.org/
General information about online sax tax collection and requirements.
http://www.bouldercolorado.gov/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3198&Itemid=1490
This is an online excerpt about the requirements to collect sales tax on the sales of printing related materials.