I’m doing a rebuild of our website, so I’m going through a lot of our existing code and making it better.
During this process I noticed a few things:
When using the test enviroment I get different results from when I use the sandbox enviroment for the same pick up and drop off address.
(for example FROM postcode N168JN TO postcode RM38FG) Sandbox quote is: £59.31
but on production the value the API returns is £34.00
With the above example I went on to the app in production and I found that I was getting the same price £34.00 - which is correct.
However… the price quoted says excl. VAT (so that says thats the price before VAT) so that got me thinking and I started to go through past invoices to see if the VAT was being added, and from what I can see VAT is NOT being added.
We are a VAT registered company, and you guys have all that information on file, so I’m guessing the fact that we are registered for VAT is the reason you are not adding it?
So to summarise what I want to know…
A. Why do you get diffrent results from Sandbox and Production pricing end points? In my case it doesn’t really matter but I think this should be made clear in the documentation.
B. The price that comes back from the API, does it include VAT or not?
C. Why is it that VAT is not being charged on my invoices?
D. For how long can I rely on the price I get from the pricing API - the reason why I ask is becuase some of my customers pay for the delivery in advance (normally 24/48 hours in advance) will the price always be the same when I actually create the order?
A: Pricing in sandbox and production can indeed be different, as sandbox pricings are default values based on distance and type of transport, and our sandbox bots don’t have VAT by default, while specific pricing can be set up in production.
B - C: The VAT charged depends on the courier’s license, some of them will not charge any VAT, but others will. The price returned by the pricing endpoint does not include VAT because we can’t know which courier will be assigned to the delivery.
D: Pricing is independent of the time. You can see more details in this article: How does the pricing work?.
In regards to your response on B, what you are saying is that it is possible for the API to give me a price without VAT, but then if the courier is registered for VAT, the price we will actually be charged is +20%?
From going through my invoices I can see that most couriers don’t charge VAT.
It is something that I will have to look in to, becuase at the moment, we pass on the Stuart charge to our customers, but it is based on the pricing API, so potentially to make sure we are not loosing out I may need to add 20% to the price I get from the API.
Hmm… - It would be a lot better if I could just rely on the price I get from the API, rather than adding 20% just in case I get charged VAT.
At the moment it doesn’t look like its a big problem becuase most couriers don’t seem to charge the VAT… but I need to think about this.
it is possible for the API to give me a price without VAT, but then if the courier is registered for VAT, the price we will actually be charged is +20%?
Indeed this is correct. I’m glad to hear it shouldn’t pose a big problem for you at this time.
Let us know if you have any further questions or you think we can provide further assistance.