Tax ticket sales based on event locationPrivate preview

Integrate Stripe Tax to calculate taxes on admission fees and tickets.

VAT and sales tax for event admission (for example, tickets to concerts, conferences, museums, or sporting events) apply to the tax jurisdiction where the event is performed, or performance location, not the customer’s location. In the US, specific local taxes (such as entertainment or amusement taxes) might also apply, in addition to state and local sales tax.

Update the Stripe SDK

Tax calculation for events is in private preview and requires updating to the latest API version. You can inspect the changelog to make sure your changes are backwards-compatible.

If needed, you can access SDK private parameters. You can also use custom requests in any of the following SDKs to call private endpoints related to this feature.

Configure Stripe Tax

When you set up Stripe Tax for tickets, set the default product tax code to txcd_20030000, General - Services. You can’t set any of the event tax codes as the default product tax code.

You can add a registration for testing through the Dashboard or the tax registrations API.

From the tax registrations page in the Dashboard, click Add registration.
Add the registrations applicable for the event location. For example:
- United States - Colorado, Sales Tax
- United States - Colorado, Boulder Admissions Tax

Stripe Tax calculations don’t incur fees in a sandbox environment. After you add a tax registration, calculating tax in live mode incurs a fee.

Tax calculations for ticket sales differ from typical tax calculations because they’re based on the performance location instead of the customer’s billing or shipping address.

Design your checkout flow

Stripe Tax only supports ticket sales using the Tax Calculation API directly or with PaymentIntents. You can’t use other integrations such as Stripe Checkout or subscriptions.

Choose the integration path that corresponds to your existing payments integration:

	Payment Intent integration (Recommended)	Custom Tax Calculation API integration
Advantages	Fewer API calls Automated handling of refunds Dashboard support, specifically useful for testing Built-in receipts support	Fully control the checkout flow Supports other payment providers, such as PayPal
Disadvantages	Preview feature might require SDK update Limited support for other payment providers, such as PayPal	Refunds require custom implementation Limited Dashboard support Testing requires API No automatic receipt generation

Both integrations require you to create a performance location and perform a tax calculation.

Create a performance location

Create a tax location of type performance and specify the address of the event venue.

You can use any address that’s eligible for a TaxCalculation in a supported country where the sales type is All Sales.

Each country requires different address formats for the location.

The response returns the id as a unique identifier for the performance location. Store this value for use in transactions where you calculate tax for sales in this location.

{
  "id": "taxloc_yB7b4tVHRb",
  // ... other fields omitted
}

A database entry for this example might be:

id	venue_name	capacity	seatplan	stripe_location_id
`<your_internal_id>`	Greenleaf Park	500	https://stripe.cdn.com/seatplan.png	`taxloc_yB7b4tVHRb`

Table: your_business.venues

Location address validation errors

If the performance location creation request returns an error, check the param and message properties for specific guidance.

Invalid address

The address is not supported by Stripe Tax for a tax location. Please use a valid address.

The address validation failed, see supported address formats for address requirements.

Unsupported country or exluded territory

The address is not supported by Stripe Tax for a tax location. Please use a location that is supported by Stripe Tax.

The country isn’t supported or the address is in an excluded territory.

Calculate Tax

Ticket sale tax calculations require the following information:

Your business location, provided during Stripe Tax configuration
The performance location ID, returned in the create location response
The customer billing address (for B2B reverse charges)
The product code (ticket, merchandise, and so on), for example, txcd_50010001–-Admission to Amusement, Entertainment and Recreation Venues--Participant.

Collect customer address

Build an address form into your checkout using the Address Element to collect required address details from your customer.
Verify that the billing address is valid for Stripe Tax. Perform this validation directly on your integration to avoid incurring tax calculation fees in live mode for validation.
Disable the checkout button until completing collection and validation.

Regional considerations

United States: We minimally require your customer’s postal code, but recommend providing a full address for the most accurate tax calculation results.
Canada: We require your customer’s postal code or province.
India: We require your customer’s state or union territory.
All other countries: We typically require only your customer’s country code. See Supported countries for specific country details.

Types of products

Tax codes can have a location requirement of:

optional: You can pass a performance location.
required: You must pass a performance location.
not supported: The tax code doesn’t support a performance location.

You can find all ticket tax codes on our product tax code reference page, including txcd_50010001, Admission to Amusement, Entertainment and Recreation Venues – Participant.

Apply performance locations

You must pass all the required data within the tax calculation API call. In this example, you calculate the taxes for a customer based in Ireland who buys a ticket for an event at your performance location in Greenleaf Park in Boulder, Colorado.

Common mistake

If the calculation endpoint returns a customer_tax_location_invalid error code, prompt your customer to check the address they entered for accuracy and completeness.

To sell an item alongside event tickets, for example, a T-shirt, add another line item to the tax calculation request and select the correct product tax code.

Apply the calculation result to a payment

The calculation API call calculates the taxes at the performance location of the event. In this case, the Greenleaf Park in Boulder, Colorado.

You can use the top-level tax breakdown to display all the taxes that are charged. In this case, the response looks similar to the following:

{
  "id": "taxcalc_fQSaHNaU",
  "amount_total": 2697,
  // ... other fields omitted
  "tax_breakdown": [
    // ... other entries omitted
    {
      "amount": 125,
      "inclusive": false,
      "tax_rate_details": {
        // ... other entries omitted
        "country": "US",
        "state": "CO",
        "percentage_decimal": "5.0", // This is just an example. The Stripe Tax calculation API returns the correct tax rate.
        "tax_type": "admissions_tax"
      },
      "taxability_reason": "standard_rated",
      "taxable_amount": 2500
    }
  ]
}

The calculation object contains an ID. Each time one of the four input parameters (business location, customer address, performance location, or product type) changes, you must perform a new calculation.

You save the latest calculation ID to commit a tax transaction later. You need this for compliant reporting.

Your checkout interface can display the taxes as a preview similar to the following example based on the tax_breakdown object of the response of the Tax Calculation API call.

2023 college football Rose Bowl Game on Mon, Jan 1, 2025 at Rose Bowl

Checkout preview line	Amount
Total Face Value	25 USD
Sales Tax (2.90%)	0.72 USD
Admission Tax (5.0%)	1.25 USD
Sub Total	26.97 USD

Tax calculation errors

If the tax calculation request returns an error, check the param and message properties for specific guidance.

Unknown tax location

Unknown tax location being passed. Please use a valid tax location.

The performance location id doesn’t belong to a performance location accessible by the Stripe account. Performance locations are exclusive to an account and you can’t share them between connected accounts or with the platform. If you’re making API calls as a Connect platform on behalf of a connected account, make sure you created the performance location for the connected account rather than your platform.

Tax code requires a tax location

Tax code txcd_50010001 requires a tax location to be passed of the type `performance`.

Your tax calculation is missing the performance location required for ticketing. You must either change the product tax code or include the performance location.

Tax code does not support a tax location

Tax code txcd_99999999 does not support a tax location with the type `performance`.

You included a performance location in your request, but the product tax code you passed doesn’t support a performance location. You must either change the product tax code or remove the performance location.

Create a payment

The payment is created with the amount_total from the tax calculation.

After the payment succeeds, you can create a tax transaction. Use this record for reporting and compliance.

With the Tax Payment Intent integration, you need to use the Payment Intents API. By defining the hooks field, you can pass the tax calculation ID to the payment intent.

This creates a payment intent and then creates a tax transaction in the background.

You can learn more about the Tax Payment Intent integration in the Tax Payment Intent integration guide.