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Shopify works out the sales tax on every reservation and add-on; Riserva only sets up the products it sells. This page is not tax advice. Whether a tasting, tour or event is taxable depends on your state and on what it includes, so decide with your accountant or tax adviser.

What Riserva sets on the products it creates

Each experience and each add-on Riserva creates is a Shopify product. Riserva creates them with:
  • Charge tax on. This is Shopify’s own default. Riserva never turns it off by itself.
  • No product category. Shopify then uses general tax rates for the item.
  • No SKU, and not a physical product. They are never shipped, so checkout doesn’t ask for a shipping address.
An add-on that links a product you already sell keeps that product’s own settings. You can give them a SKU: see SKUs and ShipCompliant.

Where Shopify taxes a reservation

Shopify taxes these products by where the sale happens:
  • Bought online (the booking window): at the guest’s billing address. With no address, Shopify uses your store’s address.
  • Sold at the register (Shopify POS): at the register’s location.
Shopify treats a product that isn’t physical as a digital product, and taxes digital products bought online at the buyer’s address. So a guest from New York who books a Napa tasting online pays no California tax. A guest from San Francisco pays San Francisco’s rate, not Napa’s. We checked this on a test store with California tax collection on. State guidance usually says the opposite: a charge for something enjoyed at the winery is taxed where the winery is. See If most of your guests come from out of state for what you can do today.

Is my experience taxable? It depends on your state

Here is what four states’ guidance says, last checked 26 October 2026. Rules change, so read the linked page and ask your adviser before relying on it. Where the guidance comes from: Other states: ask your adviser.

Change how an experience or add-on is taxed

Charge tax on this experience. In the experience’s Pricing card, under Yes — guests pay a fee to reserve, a row of small grey tags sits under the price: “Charge tax” with “Yes” or “No”, and “SKU”. Click the row (or its arrow) to open it, then tick or untick Charge tax on this experience. Saving copies your choice to the experience’s Shopify product. Charge tax on this add-on. In the add-on window, click the “Charge tax” row under the price to open it, then tick or untick Charge tax on this add-on. An add-on that offers several variants of one product has no checkbox: set Charge tax on each variant in Shopify. The row stays closed until you open it, and its tags show the current setting. It opens by itself when Riserva couldn’t save the SKU, or when Shopify hasn’t taken your last change yet. Both checkboxes show what the Shopify product says. Change Charge tax on the product in Shopify, and Riserva shows the new setting the next time you open the experience. Saving without touching a checkbox never changes the product. A product category. Open the product in Shopify and set its Category. Shopify uses it to apply product-specific rates and exemptions. A wrong category can collect too much or too little, so choose it with your adviser. See Shopify’s product categories. Tax overrides. Shopify can override the rate for products in a collection you build by hand. Overrides change the state rate only, not where the sale is taxed. See Shopify’s tax overrides.

SKUs and ShipCompliant

If you send orders to ShipCompliant (through Awtomic, for example), every line of an order may need a SKU that ShipCompliant knows. With “send local orders” on, ShipCompliant holds an order whose line has no SKU, or a SKU it doesn’t have as a product key. Give each experience and add-on a SKU. Type it in the SKU box. It sits in the folded row under the price, beside Charge tax: the “SKU” tag shows the SKU, or ”—” when there is none. Click the row to open it. In the experience’s Pricing card the row is there whether or not you charge a fee — a free reservation is still a $0 line on the order — and under No — free to book it holds the SKU alone, at the bottom of the card. In the add-on window it is under the price. Use the same SKU as the product key in ShipCompliant. The box works like Charge tax. It shows the SKU the Shopify product has, saving copies a SKU you changed to the product, and saving without touching the box never changes the product. Empty the box and save to remove the SKU. A SKU you set on the product in Shopify shows in Riserva the next time you open the experience. An add-on that offers several variants of one product has no SKU box: each variant keeps its own SKU, set in Shopify. While you add a linked product the box is missing too; the product’s own SKU comes with it, and you can change it with Edit afterwards.

If most of your guests come from out of state

Take the payment at the winery, where the register taxes it at its own location:
  • “At the visit — charged when closing out, or settled at the register.” Choose it under When is it charged? in the Pricing card. When staff add the fee to the party’s register sale, the register taxes it. If the saved card is charged instead, that pays the order made online, so the online rule applies. See At the visit.
  • Bookings made at the register with the Book reservation tile, paid in the same sale.
Shopify also describes a setup for in-person events: a physical product, picked up at your location. It adds a pickup step to checkout. See Shopify’s in-person events. Riserva doesn’t set this up for you today.

Tasting fees credited toward bottles

Credit the fee toward the guest’s bill takes the fee off the bottles at the register, as a discount on that sale. The fee itself was taxed (or not) when the guest paid it. No state guidance we found covers this. Ask your adviser how to treat it.

Learn more

What things mean on this screen: What things mean: Experiences