FAQ

General

What’s the difference between the ‘demo’ software and the licensed software?

It’s the same software, with one change—you are able to use newly released tax tables. With the demo version, you get tables which are up to a year old.

How long have you been in business?

Since 1996. We are financially solid, with very little debt and a diverse base of customers. Also, for extra security for your company, we offer language in our contract allowing you source escrow service if you desire.

What differentiates your product?

1. TaxControls software handles ‘multiversioned’ tables at year-end, which means that you can install the new year’s tables before January 1, without having to worrying about “jumping the gun” with the new formulas. The software automatically chooses the correct tax version based on pay date.

2. We also offer the ability to suggest applicable taxes for withholding, based on ZIP code. This allows you to offer easier setup of new employees in your payroll appication. If your application requires more precise tax setup, we also offer a free Docker image which identifies applicable taxes based on the employee’s workplace and resident addresses.

3. With TaxControls, the developer can now include custom tax tables with the application. This gives you complete control over the tables—you can provide additional withholding formulas, or override those from the Tax Update subscription file. These custom tables are not overwritten by new subscription data, and have all the same properties and methods as the “standard” tables included with subscriptions.

Do you cover all the states?

Yes. We cover all states which have income tax withholding, as well as DC and Puerto Rico.

• For local taxes, the Level 1 Subscription includes all states except Ohio and Pennsylvania (which are covered by generic city and school district formulas).

  Because these states carry an excessive number of local taxes, they require much more overhead to monitor and update. Since some customers do not require this level of detail for these two states, we offer them as an add-on product (a Level 2 Subscription). Some customers will only need the generic local tables for Ohio and Pennsylvania, which are included in the base subscription.

• For customers who would like just a few specific local tables for either of these states, they may be added and maintained manually by the customer.

  This option derives from the TaxControls “Custom Tax” feature, which gives you the ability to add custom tax formulas which augment or modify the subscription tax files. This feature could be used to include a handful of local taxes for Pennsylvania or Ohio, without the additional cost of the Level 2 Subscription.

Do you handle reciprocity?

Yes. Calls to the TaxNamesForZip or TaxQuery methods return the proper taxes with reciprocity agreements taken into account.

Subscriptions

When a subscription expires, does the software stop working?

No. The software will continue to work as before. However, it will not be able to read tax tables relased after the expiration date. Any table than was released while the subscription was valid will still work after expiration.

What if I download new data without a subscription?

If you don’t have a subscription, you will not be able to use new tax table files. If you download a new table anyway, you will most likely cause your application to stop working.

How much does it cost?

See the Pricing page(/general/pricing) for details.

Updates

How often are tables updated?

Tables are updated throughout the year, with the majority of changes occuring in December and January. We usually have updates in July, and a small number changes or corrections during the remaining months.

When a change occurs, we notify you by email describing the update. If it is a tax which does not affect you (or your customers), you may choose to ignore the update.

How do I know when the new year’s changes are finished, so I can send out the update to my customers?

Unfortunately, there is no way to be certain. Some state legislatures delay decisions on new rates until late December or even January. There is no way to predict when or if changes will occur. You must decide on your own deadline for distribution, then possibly issue an update in January if major changes occur after your deadline.

Do my customers have to wait until January 1 before installing the new year’s tables?

No. We issue ‘multiversioned’ tables during December (and often June), which allow both new and old formulas to be calculated. The software chooses the correct formula version based on the pay date. Just make sure you’re using the latest version of the software, and set the ‘PayDate’ property to the payroll check date.

Can I put the tax tables on my web site so my customers can download their updates?

Yes, as long as your restrict access to your customers of the licensed product only.

Programming

Are the wage base amounts available for Social Security and SUTA taxes?

Yes. Any tax with a wage base will have a corresponding formula with ” Wage Base” appended to the tax name.

For example, to get the wage base for “AL Unemployment”, you would look up the tax name “AL Unemployment Wage Base”. To compute it on an annual basis, set the PayPeriodsPerYear property to 1, and call the “TaxAmount” method with the annual wage amount.

Can I get the tax bracket?

Yes. Just substitute the TaxBracket method where you’d normally call TaxAmount. Make sure you set all the appropriate properties before calling the method.

Can I get by just using ZIP Codes to identify taxes to withhold?

Possibly. The TaxNamesForZip method returns a list of taxes to be withheld, based on the ZIP code. This is useful for applications which only need to consider state and federal taxes, since most ZIP Code boundaries fall within a single state.