Resources
Taxes & Shipping – Resources for E-Commerce on Squarespace
**Huge Disclaimer: I am not a tax expert. You should always consult with a professional about your specific situation.**
That being said, here is the information I have accumulated related to taxes and shipping along with links to my go-to resources on these topics:
Taxes – Use Squarespace’s TaxJar Extension
TaxJar will automatically calculate US sales tax rates during checkout. This way, you don’t need to manually set up tax rates for everything.
To set it up, you will need to know what states you have nexus in (TaxJar article on economic nexus laws by state)
Cost: if you are on a Squarespace Commerce plan (which you should be if you’re selling things), then you get a free TaxJar account to automatically calculate sales tax. This is included in your Squarespace subscription. If you would like to do more with TaxJar, you’ll need to upgrade to a paid account.
TaxJar only works for US-based sellers shipping within the US. You will need to set up manual tax rates for sales outside of the US. View Squarespace’s help article on how to set that up.
Resources for Getting Started
Setting up automatic tax rates in the US (with TaxJar), Squarespace Help Center
The Definitive Guide to Squarespace Sales Tax, written by Kristine Neil
California-Specific Information
From TaxJar: California Sales Tax Guide for Businesses
California Online Sales Tax Explained by Kelley Birrell, LedgerGurus.
California City & County Sales & Use Tax Rates (from the California Department of Tax and Fee Administration – CDTFA)
Shipping
If you get to the point where shipping-related tasks is taking too much time, consider Shipping Extensions that can take care of some of that for you. Squarespace e-commerce expert Kristine Neil has a great overview of the options on her blog.
Some other resources from Kristine:
Squarespace Help Center Resources on Shipping:
Squarespace Payment Processing Options
Main Options: Stripe and PayPal
If you are having customers complete a purchase and checkout on your Squarespace website, your options are Stripe and PayPal.
If you use Stripe, you can enable Apple Pay. If you use Stripe and are on the Commerce plan or above, you can enable Afterpay.
If you use Squarespace point of sale for in person payments, you’ll use Square.
If you use PayPal, you’ll need to transfer the money you make out of PayPal into your bank account, whereas Stripe automatically deposits it in your bank account.
If you use PayPal, you need to have a Business Account. You can upgrade a personal account pretty easily. Just login to your account, go to Settings (top right corner), scroll down and click Upgrade to a Business account. Fill out the information (you’ll need your business name - if you’re a Sole Proprietor it’s just your name) and submit.
Squarespace now offers their own payment processor - Squarespace Payments. At this point, I would still recommend using Stripe instead.
FAQs
Can I offer payment plans?
You can enable Afterpay if you are using Stripe and are on one the Commerce plans, but only for physical products (not service or digital products).
What platform do you recommend?
I would go with Stripe in most cases.