Amazon to Begin Collecting Sales Tax Nationwide on April 1

Amazon.com announced it will begin collecting sales taxes from all states with a sales tax as of April 1, 2017. After years of fighting the imposition of sales tax on a state-by-state basis — from court battles to corporate exemptions — Amazon has been pursuing a different tack of late. The online retailer has been adding, not fighting, states to its list of jurisdictions subject to sales tax. Next month, Amazon will begin collecting sales tax in Hawaii, Idaho, Maine and New Mexico. Those four states are the last to be added to the list, rounding out a complete list of 45 states where Amazon will now collect sales tax. (Amazon won't collect sales tax in Alaska, Delaware, Montana, New Hampshire and Oregon, where there is no state sales tax.)

Total Retail's Take: This is a change in policy for Amazon, which has long fought against the collection of state sales tax for online purchases. However, with the online retailer's expanding distribution network across the country (it currently has distribution centers in 28 states) and push into brick-and-mortar, it figured to be a moot point in the near future, as Amazon would have a physical presence in nearly every state, and thus be required to collect sales tax from customers in those states. This announcement does represent somewhat of a victory for traditional brick-and-mortar retailers, which have argued that Amazon and other online pure-plays should be subject to the same tax collection requirements as they are.