[tjbiddle]

1. Taxes can change quickly, and it's a pain in the ass to keep up with. If you're now needing to deal with changing the printed price on tens, hundreds, thousands of items - I can't even imagine.

2. Online sales you won't even be able to calculate it until the customer puts in their shipping information. And no, they can't figure that out beforehand as there are a myriad of reasons why where their IP is does not mean where it's being shipped to, which is where the taxes need to be calculated.

[tester756]

"Taxes can change quickly"

Like, how quickly?

<1 day? otherwise it shouldnt be a problem

[pbhjpbhj]

Shops change their prices sometimes multiple times a day (UK), sales taxes change on the order of decades here. Stores can cope.

It sounds like your legislature spend all their time setting taxes?

[heimidal]

I'm curious, do books have prices printed on them in the UK? Here in the US, the suggested retail price (pre-tax, obviously) is generally printed by the manufacturer on the back or inside the dust cover of every book.

[pbhjpbhj]

Yes, books have RRP (recommended retail price). That price includes all taxes.

[heimidal]

Gotcha. In the US, if you tried to keep that system, you’d need a different printed MSRP per tax nexus and books in warehouses would no longer be fungible.

[ImPostingOnHN]

Not really, that's just a manufacturer-recommended price for the seller to charge, the seller can put whatever they want on the actual price tag.