Scott Bieser

The Tax Man Cometh

Added 2020-05-07 15:21:50 +0000 UTC

To my awesome Patrons,

I wanted to give you an update on some changes that we’ll be seeing which may affect some of your pledges. Due to new laws passing in several countries and US states, Patreon will be required to start charging sales tax on some pledges starting July 1st.

Less than half of all patrons will be charged sales tax, and for most, the amount will be very small. For example, sales tax rates in the US range from 4% to 11%, so on a $5 pledge, that would be between 20 cents and 55 cents.

Whether or not you will be charged sales tax depends on your location, and what is considered taxable there. Not every pledge is taxable, not all benefits are taxable in every location, and sometimes only a fraction of a pledge will be taxable. The money that Patreon collects as a result of these laws are paid directly to local governments.

Patreon will be offering me some tools to fine-tune my tier structure and hopefully reduce the tax burden for you. I would prefer to simply include taxes in my pricing -- I will pay a tax under duress but do not wish to be a tax collector -- however US law apparently prohibits this (according to Patreon, I will be looking into that).

If you’re in a location where sales tax will be required, you should expect to receive an email from Patreon with more information about this very soon, but I wanted to make sure you were aware of these changes way ahead of July 1st when they go into effect.

If you have questions, you should be able to find answers here. If you still have questions, the best place to get an answer is from Patreon’s customer support team, here.

Thank you for all of your support.