Currently, Aura’s pricing and profit calculations only include marketplace referral fees and do not provide a dedicated field to account for sales tax costs. As a result, sellers like myself have to manually combine sales tax with profit margins, which makes pricing calculations less transparent and harder to manage at scale.

This is a significant limitation because not all sellers have or qualify for a reseller certificate, meaning sales tax must be paid upfront when sourcing products. For those sellers, the tax represents a real cost that directly impacts profitability, and it should be accounted for separately from profit.

Problems with the Current Setup:

1) Inaccurate profit reporting: Sales tax is currently bundled into profit, which inflates profit margins and makes performance metrics unreliable.

2) Manual calculations required: Sellers must constantly adjust profit percentages to “bake in” tax, increasing the risk of errors.

3) Limited flexibility: Different jurisdictions have different sales tax rates, and some suppliers charge tax while others do not. There’s no easy way to reflect this variability in Aura.

Proposed Functionality:

1) Add a dedicated “Sales Tax” field in the pricing settings for each product or globally at the account level.

2) Allow the tax amount to be entered either as a percentage (e.g., 8.25%) or a fixed amount per product.

3) Include the sales tax in the cost calculation formula so that profit margins and repricing rules are based on the true landed cost of the item.

4) Show sales tax as a separate line in the profit breakdown view, alongside referral fees and cost of goods.

Benefits:

1) Accurate profit tracking: Sellers can clearly see profit margins after taxes and fees.

2) Simplified workflows: No need to manually adjust profit targets or embed tax costs in profit fields.

3) Better support for diverse seller profiles: This change accommodates both tax-exempt sellers and those who are not exempt, improving Aura’s usability across the board.