The money and the law

The seller, in law

Every sale has one seller in law. Payment companies call that seller the merchant of record: the name on the fan’s card statement, and the party that takes the money, owes the tax on the sale, gives the refund and answers a dispute. Tax authorities use their own words for it, such as retailer, vendor or taxable person. They mean the same party.

Who that is depends on how the shop is set up, and not on whose name is on the shirt.

The artist’s own store

Whoever owns the store is the seller. The store’s software works out the tax at checkout, but it does not register or pay for the owner. Shopify’s help centre tells a merchant to register with a state’s tax authority first, and to set up collection once the permit arrives.

A marketplace or creator platform

The platform is the seller, or the law treats it as one. Fourthwall, a creator platform, says it is the merchant of record for everything sold through a creator’s shop, and that it calculates, collects and pays over sales tax and VAT. The creator’s tax job is to report the payouts as income.

The printer

A company that prints and posts the order is the seller’s supplier, and not the seller. In Texas, a seller that holds a sales tax permit buys goods for resale free of tax by giving its supplier a resale certificate.

Filed or disclosedEach company’s own help pages. · Source: Shopify Help Center, Review your US tax liability insights, Fourthwall, Creator tax information FAQ · checked 6 October 2026

Official sourceResale certificates in Texas. · Source: Texas Comptroller, Fairs, Festivals, Markets and Shows · checked 6 October 2026

The rest of this chapter follows from that one fact. The tax, the refunds, the disputes and the product itself all land on the merchant of record.

Region and tax	The artist’s own store	A marketplace	The table at a show
United States: sales tax	The seller, in each state where it has nexus	The marketplace, where the state has a marketplace law	Whoever makes the sale, from the first one
United Kingdom: VAT	The seller, once registered: over £90,000 a year, or from the first sale if based abroad	The marketplace, for an overseas seller or a parcel from abroad worth £135 or less	Whoever makes the sale, on the same test as online
European Union: VAT	The seller, at the rate of the fan’s country	The marketplace, for a seller outside the EU or an import worth €150 or less	Whoever makes the sale, under the rules of the country the show is in

A summary of the sections below, where each rule is set out with its conditions.

Official sourceThe tax authorities’ own pages. · Source: New York State tax department, Registration requirement for businesses with no physical presence, California CDTFA, Tax Guide for Marketplace Facilitator Act, Texas Comptroller, Engaged in Business, GOV.UK, Register for VAT: when to register, GOV.UK, VAT and overseas goods sold to customers in the UK using online marketplaces, European Commission, The One Stop Shop, European Commission, VAT rules for small enterprises · checked 6 October 2026

The United States: sales tax, state by state

Sales tax in the United States is set by the states, and each has its own rate, rules and returns. Cities and counties add to it: Texas charges 6.25%, and local bodies there can add up to 2% more.

Official sourceSource: Texas Comptroller, Sales and Use Tax · checked 6 October 2026

A state can make a seller collect its tax once the seller has nexus there, which means enough of a connection. Until 2018 that meant being in the state. On 21 June 2018 the Supreme Court’s ruling in South Dakota v. Wayfair removed the bar on a state taxing sellers with no physical presence in it. Selling enough into a state is now a connection in itself, called economic nexus, and each state sets its own threshold.

Official sourceA state tax department’s account of the ruling. · Source: New York State tax department, Registration requirement for businesses with no physical presence · checked 6 October 2026

Official sourceEach state’s own page. · Source: South Dakota Department of Revenue, Sales & Use Tax, California CDTFA, Use Tax Collection Requirements Based on Sales into California, Texas Comptroller, Remote Sellers, New York State tax department, Registration requirement for businesses with no physical presence · checked 6 October 2026

A seller based abroad is counted the same way. The Texas Comptroller’s page for remote sellers gives a seller located outside the United States its own route to register.

Official sourceSource: Texas Comptroller, Remote Sellers · checked 6 October 2026

One show is presence

Physical presence is the older test, and it has no threshold. South Dakota puts it plainly: any business with a physical presence in the state must be licensed, and its minimum thresholds do not apply. Texas counts a temporary location, and an employee or representative who sells in the state. A merch table is both.

The states handle a visiting seller differently. Texas says an out-of-state seller engaged in business there, “even if operating here temporarily”, must hold a Texas permit. The permit is free, and a return is due for every period whether or not anything was sold. California issues a temporary seller’s permit for selling at one location for less than 90 days, and each location is registered.

Official sourceSource: South Dakota Department of Revenue, Sales & Use Tax, Texas Comptroller, Engaged in Business, Texas Comptroller, Fairs, Festivals, Markets and Shows, California CDTFA, Temporary Sellers · checked 6 October 2026

At the table, the tax belongs to whoever makes the sale. atVenu, which makes settlement software for merch tables, tells its users that whoever is vending usually keeps the tax, and that it is the artist’s responsibility unless the venue specifically says it is keeping it.

Filed or disclosedSource: atVenu help, Settling a show on the web · checked 6 October 2026

At fairs, festivals and markets in Texas the organiser is drawn in as well. A promoter must collect the tax on sales by any seller there without a permit, and can be liable for it.

Official sourceSource: Texas Comptroller, Fairs, Festivals, Markets and Shows · checked 6 October 2026

Presence also outlasts the show. California’s regulation keeps a retailer registered for any calendar year in which it has a physical presence in the state, and for the calendar year after. A registered retailer collects California’s tax on what it sells to customers there, online orders included. So one night at a table can follow a seller’s online store into the state until the end of the next year. The regulation presumes that any physical presence is enough, and leaves the retailer to show that its own was too slight.

Official sourceSource: California CDTFA, Regulation 1684 · checked 6 October 2026

Registering is the small part of the work. The Streamlined Sales Tax Registration System, run by its member states, is a free single application for its 23 full member states. What follows is the returns: Texas, for one, wants a return by the 20th of the month after each reporting period, and charges $50 for a late one.

Official sourceSource: Streamlined Sales Tax Governing Board, Sales Tax Registration SSTRS, Texas Comptroller, Fairs, Festivals, Markets and Shows · checked 6 October 2026

The United Kingdom: VAT

UK VAT is one national tax. The standard rate is 20% and covers most goods, with children’s clothes among the exceptions at zero. An online seller has to show the price including all taxes, so VAT sits inside the price a customer sees.

Official sourceSource: GOV.UK, VAT rates, GOV.UK, Online and distance selling · checked 6 October 2026

A business based in the UK must register for VAT once its taxable turnover for the last twelve months passes £90,000, or is expected to within the next 30 days. Below that it charges none, unless it chooses to register. A business based outside the UK has no threshold. It must register as soon as it supplies any goods in the UK, whatever its turnover.

Official sourceSource: GOV.UK, Register for VAT: when to register · checked 6 October 2026

Goods posted to a customer in Great Britain from abroad are taxed by the value of the parcel. Where a consignment is worth £135 or less, the seller charges UK VAT at the point of sale and has to register to do it. Sold through an online marketplace, the same parcel is the marketplace’s to account for. Above £135, import VAT and customs rules apply at the border. The rules cover goods sold since 1 January 2021, and an older relief for parcels worth £15 or less has been removed.

Official sourceSource: GOV.UK, VAT and overseas goods sold directly to customers in the UK, GOV.UK, VAT and overseas goods sold to customers in the UK using online marketplaces · checked 6 October 2026

In the other direction, goods sent from Great Britain to a customer abroad can normally be zero-rated. No UK VAT is charged, and the tax of the country they arrive in applies instead.

Official sourceSource: GOV.UK, Exports, sending goods abroad and charging VAT · checked 6 October 2026

The European Union: VAT and the One Stop Shop

EU VAT is charged at the rate of the country the goods are delivered to. Each of the 27 member states sets its own standard rate, which cannot be lower than 15%.

Official sourceSource: Your Europe, VAT rules and rates, European Commission, Buying goods online coming from a non-European Union country · checked 6 October 2026

For a seller established in one EU country, the first €10,000 a year of sales sent to customers in other member states is taxed at home. Past that, each sale carries the VAT of the customer’s country. Since 1 July 2021 the One Stop Shop (OSS) has let a seller register in one member state and declare all of those sales on one quarterly return. Without it, the seller registers in every member state it sells into. The scheme is optional, but a seller that joins uses it for every member state.

Official sourceSource: European Commission, The One Stop Shop · checked 6 October 2026

A parcel sent to an EU customer from outside the EU, the UK included, is an import, and VAT is due on it whatever its value. For a consignment worth €150 or less the seller can charge that VAT at checkout through the Import One Stop Shop (IOSS), on a monthly return. A seller outside the EU has to appoint an intermediary established in the EU, who becomes liable for the VAT. Where the seller has not charged it, the postal operator or courier collects it from the customer on delivery, and typically charges a clearance fee as well.

A marketplace is treated as the seller here too. It is the deemed supplier, and owes the VAT, on an imported consignment worth €150 or less, and on goods sold inside the EU by a seller established outside it.

Official sourceSource: European Commission, The One Stop Shop, European Commission, Buying goods online coming from a non-European Union country · checked 6 October 2026

Customs duty changed in 2026. Until 30 June, a consignment worth €150 or less paid none. From 1 July 2026 the EU charges a flat €3 on each item in it. An item is a kind of goods, by its customs classification, and not a count: the Commission’s own example is five t-shirts in one parcel, which is one item and €3. The flat rate runs until 1 July 2028, when the ordinary tariff takes over. It is not collected from the customer on delivery. The party that owes it is the platform, the seller or the carrier that declares the goods.

Official sourceSource: European Commission, Guidance on the temporary flat fee on low-value imports, European Commission, Questions and answers on €3 customs duty · checked 6 October 2026

A sale across a table is not a distance sale, so the One Stop Shop does not cover it. It is a sale in the country the show is in, under that country’s VAT rules. The exemptions that member states give small businesses do not reach a visiting seller from outside the EU: the Commission’s guide says non-EU small enterprises, UK ones included, cannot use the scheme.

Official sourceSource: European Commission, The One Stop Shop, European Commission, VAT rules for small enterprises · checked 6 October 2026

When a parcel crosses a border

An order printed in one country and posted to another meets a second set of rules at the border. All three systems changed how they treat low-value parcels between 2021 and 2026.

Official sourceSource: Federal Register, Indefinite Suspension of the De Minimis Exemption (US Customs and Border Protection, 24 June 2026), GOV.UK, VAT and overseas goods sold directly to customers in the UK, European Commission, The One Stop Shop, European Commission, Guidance on the temporary flat fee on low-value imports · checked 6 October 2026

A shirt printed inside the country it is delivered to is never imported, so the rules in this table do not touch it. The sales tax or VAT in the sections above still does.

Chargebacks

A chargeback is a card payment reversed by the cardholder’s bank after the cardholder disputes it. In the United States the Fair Credit Billing Act gives credit card holders a dispute process for billing errors, which include being charged for something that never arrived. The cardholder’s letter has to reach the card issuer within 60 days of the first bill that shows the error.

Official sourceSource: Federal Trade Commission, Using Credit Cards and Disputing Charges · checked 6 October 2026

UK law goes a different way. Section 75 of the Consumer Credit Act 1974 makes a credit card issuer liable alongside the supplier for a breach of contract, but only for a single item priced above £100 and at no more than £30,000. That leaves a t-shirt outside it.

Official sourceSource: legislation.gov.uk, Consumer Credit Act 1974, section 75 · checked 6 October 2026

Whatever the route, the dispute lands on the merchant of record. Shopify tells its merchants that the bank takes the disputed amount straight away, with a chargeback fee. The amount comes back if the merchant wins, and the fee may, depending on the country. Stripe’s fee for receiving a dispute is not refunded for businesses outside Mexico, and contesting a dispute costs a second fee. A lost dispute costs the seller the goods, the postage, the payment and the fee.

Filed or disclosedEach company’s own pages. Neither page gives the amount of the fee. · Source: Shopify Help Center, Chargebacks and inquiries, Stripe, How disputes work · checked 6 October 2026

Selling across currencies has a card cost of its own. Shopify charges a conversion fee when a customer pays in a currency other than the one the store is paid out in: 1.5% for a store in the United States, and 2% in its other regions.

Filed or disclosedSource: Shopify Help Center, Fees and costs · checked 6 October 2026

What else the seller answers for

Tax is one of the duties that follow the merchant of record. Four more come up with merch.

Delivery dates

In the United States a seller needs a reasonable basis for any shipping time it states, and for shipping within 30 days where it states none. If it cannot ship in time, it has to get the customer’s consent to the delay or refund the order. In the UK, goods are to be delivered within 30 days unless the customer has agreed otherwise.

Changes of mind

A customer in the UK or the EU who buys at a distance can cancel within 14 days of delivery without giving a reason. The UK regulations make an exception for goods made to the customer’s specifications or clearly personalised. They do not mention print-on-demand.

Labels

In the United States most clothing has to carry a label giving its fibre content, its country of origin, and the name or registered number of a business responsible for it. A seller that replaces the maker’s label with its own takes the duty on: the new label gives the seller’s name or number with the rest of the required information, and the seller keeps records for three years. Registered numbers are issued only to businesses in the United States.

A business in the EU

Since 13 December 2024 the EU’s General Product Safety Regulation has required every product it covers to have a responsible economic operator in the EU: a manufacturer there, an importer, an authorised representative or a fulfilment service provider.

Official sourceSource: Federal Trade Commission, Business Guide to the Mail, Internet, or Telephone Order Merchandise Rule, GOV.UK, Online and distance selling, legislation.gov.uk, Consumer Contracts Regulations 2013, regulation 28, EUR-Lex, Consumer information, right of withdrawal and other consumer rights, Federal Trade Commission, Threading Your Way Through the Labeling Requirements Under the Textile and Wool Acts, EUR-Lex, General product safety regulation (2023) · checked 6 October 2026