Florida levies a 6% state sales tax on most tangible personal property sold at retail plus applicable county surtaxes (ranging from 0.5% to 1.5%). Some items are exempt — most groceries, prescription drugs, and certain agricultural supplies — but services are generally exempt unless they involve fabrication or installation of tangible property. Verify taxability for every product or service you sell at floridarevenue.com before your first sale.

Register for a Florida sales and use tax certificate at floridarevenue.com under "Register Your Business" — the process takes about 20 minutes and is free. You will receive a Certificate of Registration that must be displayed at your place of business. You also need a separate registration for each physical location if you operate in multiple counties. Operating without registration while collecting sales tax is a criminal offense in Florida.

You collect sales tax from your customer at the point of sale, hold it in trust, and remit it to the Florida Department of Revenue on your assigned filing schedule. Never spend the sales tax you collect — it is not your money, it is the state's. Set up a separate sub-account in your business checking to hold collected sales tax so it is never accidentally spent on operations.

Since the Supreme Court's 2018 South Dakota v. Wayfair ruling, Florida businesses selling online must collect sales tax in states where they meet the economic nexus threshold (usually $100,000 in annual sales or 200 transactions). Florida itself began requiring out-of-state sellers to collect Florida sales tax in July 2021. If you sell in multiple states, use TaxJar or Avalara to automate multi-state compliance rather than tracking each state manually.