Prices and tax in koha (also send on koha-devel)
Hi, I'm a French librarian working at the University Lyon3 and in charge of Koha. I want to know your feelings about the prices processing in koha and the question of the tax.
From 3.10 version, some prices are recalculated according to this tax before they are stocked in the database. It's a pretty good thing but not all the prices are recalculated and there's sometimes a bad calculation : tax is added or subtracted 2 times... Another difficulty is that there's a lot of tables in acquisitions and not all of them works in the same way...
So I wonder if a decision about the prices and a correction of all the tables in acquisitions isn't necessary... My suggestion is to stock all the price including tax and to calculate the price in the budget and in all the displaying tables according to the preferences in the vendor. I think, all the scripts of calculation and the template for displaying tables have to be correct. It could be a new goal for koha 3.16 or perhaps for koha 3.18... I'm sorry if my explanations are short and not very clear but I want to know what the community thinks of it. Have a good day Sonia BOUIS ------------------------------------------------------ Responsable du Système intégré de gestion des bibliothèques SERVICE COMMUN DE LA DOCUMENTATION Université Jean Moulin Lyon 3 6 Cours Albert Thomas - B.P. 8242 - 69355 Lyon Cedex 08 ligne directe : +33 (0)4 78 78 79 03 | Fax : +33 (0)4 78 78 79 89 ------------------------------------------------------ http://scd.univ-lyon3.fr<http://scd.univ-lyon3.fr/> L'Université Jean Moulin est membre fondateur de l'Université de Lyon
Hi, On Wed, Dec 18, 2013 at 6:16 AM, BOUIS Sonia <sonia.bouis@univ-lyon3.fr>wrote:
So I wonder if a decision about the prices and a correction of all the tables in acquisitions isn't necessary... My suggestion is to stock all the price including tax and to calculate the price in the budget and in all the displaying tables according to the preferences in the vendor. I think, all the scripts of calculation and the template for displaying tables have to be correct.
It could be a new goal for koha 3.16 or perhaps for koha 3.18...
This is an excellent question. There are have been a number of bugs over the years regarding the calculation of taxes for acquisitions, including a number which are still open [1]. It's not an easy one to answer, though, at least in part. The easy part is to say that list prices, effective prices, tax amounts, and vendor discounts should be handled consistently in all parts of the acquisitions module. The not-so-easy part is to decide how. For example, should an effective price as stored in the database be inclusive of tax or exclusive of tax? I could see either approach working. One of the tricky bits is that tax policy varies so much. For example, in the U.S. prices are almost always quoted exclusive of any applicable sales tax. If you want to know the price a library would pay for a book, it would be something like take the list price, subtract the vendor discount, then add the applicable sales tax -- though since the U.S. does not have a national sales tax, the sales tax rate you pay depends on things like where you are, where the book vendor is, and if you are subject to paying use tax in your home state. I am not an acquisitions librarian, by the way, so it's entirely possible that I've got a detail wrong in the above paragraph. Consequently, I propose that we expand this thread for users (or potential users) of Koha to weigh in on what their expectations are regarding accounting for taxes in acquisitions. Some questions to get started: - If you get quoted a price for an item, is that price inclusive or exclusive of tax? - Do you want to be able to account for taxes in a separate fund from the fund that pays for the main cost of the item? - As a library, are there taxes that you would pay when purchasing items that subsequently get refunded at the end of the year? - If a vendor gives you a discount, is the discount applied to the pre-tax price or the price that includes tax? - What factors govern the tax rate that applies to a given item? [1] E.g., 3980, 10613, 11062, 2865. Regards, Galen -- Galen Charlton Manager of Implementation Equinox Software, Inc. / The Open Source Experts email: gmc@esilibrary.com direct: +1 770-709-5581 cell: +1 404-984-4366 skype: gmcharlt web: http://www.esilibrary.com/ Supporting Koha and Evergreen: http://koha-community.org & http://evergreen-ils.org
Hi, I'm not very fast to answer but I'm still interested by the question so I will try to answer at Galen's questions and I hope that there'll be several answers. - If you get quoted a price for an item, is that price inclusive or exclusive of tax? It depends on the vendor : some are giving price including tax and other not. But they always do the same manner. - Do you want to be able to account for taxes in a separate fund from the fund that pays for the main cost of the item? No, in my library, we don't need that. But I think it's true in other institutions - As a library, are there taxes that you would pay when purchasing items that subsequently get refunded at the end of the year? No, we don't have any refund at the end of the year - If a vendor gives you a discount, is the discount applied to the pre-tax price or the price that includes tax? The discount is applied on price including tax - What factors govern the tax rate that applies to a given item? It depends on the origin of the vendor (France, European Union, Non European Union) Your turn.. :) Regards Sonia BOUIS ------------------------------------------------------ Responsable du Système intégré de gestion des bibliothèques SERVICE COMMUN DE LA DOCUMENTATION Université Jean Moulin Lyon 3 6 Cours Albert Thomas - B.P. 8242 - 69355 Lyon Cedex 08 ligne directe : +33 (0)4 78 78 79 03 | Fax : +33 (0)4 78 78 79 89 ------------------------------------------------------ http://scd.univ-lyon3.fr<http://scd.univ-lyon3.fr/> L'Université Jean Moulin est membre fondateur de l'Université de Lyon De : Galen Charlton [mailto:gmc@esilibrary.com] Envoyé : mercredi 18 décembre 2013 17:57 À : BOUIS Sonia Cc : koha@lists.katipo.co.nz Objet : Re: [Koha] Prices and tax in koha (also send on koha-devel) Hi, On Wed, Dec 18, 2013 at 6:16 AM, BOUIS Sonia <sonia.bouis@univ-lyon3.fr<mailto:sonia.bouis@univ-lyon3.fr>> wrote: So I wonder if a decision about the prices and a correction of all the tables in acquisitions isn't necessary... My suggestion is to stock all the price including tax and to calculate the price in the budget and in all the displaying tables according to the preferences in the vendor. I think, all the scripts of calculation and the template for displaying tables have to be correct. It could be a new goal for koha 3.16 or perhaps for koha 3.18... This is an excellent question. There are have been a number of bugs over the years regarding the calculation of taxes for acquisitions, including a number which are still open [1]. It's not an easy one to answer, though, at least in part. The easy part is to say that list prices, effective prices, tax amounts, and vendor discounts should be handled consistently in all parts of the acquisitions module. The not-so-easy part is to decide how. For example, should an effective price as stored in the database be inclusive of tax or exclusive of tax? I could see either approach working. One of the tricky bits is that tax policy varies so much. For example, in the U.S. prices are almost always quoted exclusive of any applicable sales tax. If you want to know the price a library would pay for a book, it would be something like take the list price, subtract the vendor discount, then add the applicable sales tax -- though since the U.S. does not have a national sales tax, the sales tax rate you pay depends on things like where you are, where the book vendor is, and if you are subject to paying use tax in your home state. I am not an acquisitions librarian, by the way, so it's entirely possible that I've got a detail wrong in the above paragraph. Consequently, I propose that we expand this thread for users (or potential users) of Koha to weigh in on what their expectations are regarding accounting for taxes in acquisitions. Some questions to get started: - If you get quoted a price for an item, is that price inclusive or exclusive of tax? - Do you want to be able to account for taxes in a separate fund from the fund that pays for the main cost of the item? - As a library, are there taxes that you would pay when purchasing items that subsequently get refunded at the end of the year? - If a vendor gives you a discount, is the discount applied to the pre-tax price or the price that includes tax? - What factors govern the tax rate that applies to a given item? [1] E.g., 3980, 10613, 11062, 2865. Regards, Galen -- Galen Charlton Manager of Implementation Equinox Software, Inc. / The Open Source Experts email: gmc@esilibrary.com<mailto:gmc@esilibrary.com> direct: +1 770-709-5581 cell: +1 404-984-4366 skype: gmcharlt web: http://www.esilibrary.com/ Supporting Koha and Evergreen: http://koha-community.org & http://evergreen-ils.org
Hi, I have asked one of our libraries using acquisitions to take a look at the questions, forwarding their answers: - If you get quoted a price for an item, is that price inclusive or exclusive of tax? * Usually inclusive, fixed retail price. * We do not order much internationally. - Do you want to be able to account for taxes in a separate fund from the fund that pays for the main cost of the item? * No, in my library, we don't need that. - As a library, are there taxes that you would pay when purchasing items that subsequently get refunded at the end of the year? * No, we don't get any refund at the end of the year. - If a vendor gives you a discount, is the discount applied to the pre-tax price or the price that includes tax? * The discount is applied on price including tax. - What factors govern the tax rate that applies to a given item? * It depends on the origin of the vendor (France, European Union, Non European Union), but the German tax law applies I can add to the last question that in Germany different tax rates apply for books/printed materials and electronic resources. Who is next? :) Katrin -- Katrin Fischer Bibliotheksservice-Zentrum Baden-Wuerttemberg (BSZ) 78457 Konstanz / Germany Phone: +49 7531 - 88 4934 E-Mail: katrin.fischer@bsz-bw.de http://bsz-bw.de
-----Original Message----- From: koha-bounces@lists.katipo.co.nz [mailto:koha- bounces@lists.katipo.co.nz] On Behalf Of BOUIS Sonia Sent: Saturday, January 18, 2014 2:46 PM To: Galen Charlton Cc: koha@lists.katipo.co.nz Subject: Re: [Koha] Prices and tax in koha (also send on koha-devel)
Hi, I'm not very fast to answer but I'm still interested by the question so I will try to answer at Galen's questions and I hope that there'll be several answers. - If you get quoted a price for an item, is that price inclusive or exclusive of tax? It depends on the vendor : some are giving price including tax and other not. But they always do the same manner. - Do you want to be able to account for taxes in a separate fund from the fund that pays for the main cost of the item? No, in my library, we don't need that. But I think it's true in other institutions - As a library, are there taxes that you would pay when purchasing items that subsequently get refunded at the end of the year? No, we don't have any refund at the end of the year - If a vendor gives you a discount, is the discount applied to the pre-tax price or the price that includes tax? The discount is applied on price including tax - What factors govern the tax rate that applies to a given item? It depends on the origin of the vendor (France, European Union, Non European Union)
Your turn.. :)
Regards
Sonia BOUIS ------------------------------------------------------ Responsable du Système intégré de gestion des bibliothèques SERVICE COMMUN DE LA DOCUMENTATION Université Jean Moulin Lyon 3 6 Cours Albert Thomas - B.P. 8242 - 69355 Lyon Cedex 08
ligne directe : +33 (0)4 78 78 79 03 | Fax : +33 (0)4 78 78 79 89 ------------------------------------------------------ http://scd.univ-lyon3.fr<http://scd.univ-lyon3.fr/>
L'Université Jean Moulin est membre fondateur de l'Université de Lyon
Hi everyone, I work with ILS's on behalf of YBP. We've recently had an ongoing discussion with another system supplier about tax and freight charges. Having Koha calculate charges based on percentages will likely lead to differences by pennies, especially if a currency conversion is also involved. That may be fine, so long as the library is able to adjust the invoiced amounts in Koha to make it equal the vendor invoice. In any event, I'm sending along these thoughts in case they might be helpful to the discussion: YBP always produces tax and freight consistently, at the invoice level, on printed and EDI invoices. However we find that libraries prefer to work with these charges locally in different ways. 1. Do not import the non-line item charges - libraries work with those charges manually, or leave them out of the local system accounting. This can be especially desirable if they tax is some sort of GST that is accounted for at the university level, and reimbursed to the university separately from the library. 2. Allocate to each line item (in which case you have to decide if you're allocating a) against each line item equally or b) proportionally depending on the cost of the particular item, and then figure out what to do with the rounding/remaining cents to make the line item extra charges match the invoice-level amount that the vendor originally output) 3. Allocate as a single charge to a separate fund from the regular line items (in which case, the library system needs to be able to assign a default fund for tax and/or freight as part of the vendor setup or as invoices are keyed/loaded) All my best, Ann-Marie Breaux Vice President, Academic Service Integration YBP Library Services Phone/fax: +1 (678) 445-5720 e-mail: abreaux@ybp.com
-----Original Message----- From: koha-bounces@lists.katipo.co.nz [mailto:koha-bounces@lists.katipo.co.nz] On Behalf Of BOUIS Sonia Sent: Wednesday, December 18, 2013 9:17 AM To: koha@lists.katipo.co.nz Subject: [Koha] Prices and tax in koha (also send on koha-devel)
Hi, I'm a French librarian working at the University Lyon3 and in charge of Koha. I want to know your feelings about the prices processing in koha and the question of the tax. From 3.10 version, some prices are recalculated according to this tax before they are stocked in the database. It's a pretty good thing but not all the prices are recalculated and there's sometimes a bad calculation : tax is added or subtracted 2 times... Another difficulty is that there's a lot of tables in acquisitions and not all of them works in the same way...
So I wonder if a decision about the prices and a correction of all the tables in acquisitions isn't necessary... My suggestion is to stock all the price including tax and to calculate the price in the budget and in all the displaying tables according to the preferences in the vendor. I think, all the scripts of calculation and the template for displaying tables have to be correct.
It could be a new goal for koha 3.16 or perhaps for koha 3.18...
I'm sorry if my explanations are short and not very clear but I want to know what the community thinks of it.
Have a good day
Sonia BOUIS ------------------------------------------------------ Responsable du Système intégré de gestion des bibliothèques SERVICE COMMUN DE LA DOCUMENTATION Université Jean Moulin Lyon 3 6 Cours Albert Thomas - B.P. 8242 - 69355 Lyon Cedex 08
ligne directe : +33 (0)4 78 78 79 03 | Fax : +33 (0)4 78 78 79 89 ------------------------------------------------------ http://scd.univ-lyon3.fr<http://scd.univ-lyon3.fr/>
L'Université Jean Moulin est membre fondateur de l'Université de Lyon
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participants (4)
-
Ann-Marie Breaux -
BOUIS Sonia -
Fischer, Katrin -
Galen Charlton