In creativehub when a user is setting up and pricing their products, we show the profit they may make with this print sale. In showing the profit we make an assumption that they will have to charge 20% VAT on the print sale.
However, we do not actually add VAT to the print sale price, we just import the price into the user’s print store, without any VAT or sales tax setting. Setting the VAT or sales tax rates is done in the user’s store (and the price can also be re-set in the user’s store). So when we show the net amount in creativehub we are just showing an indication what the net price would be if the user had to pay 20% VAT. In practice what they do pay is down to where they live and where they are sending the artworks, and what they charge in terms of VAT should be set in their store accounts whether that’s WIX, Squarespace, Etsy or Shopify.
We charge VAT on the print costs, again this is based on where the order is being sent to. If it is being sent to the UK it is 20%, the EU it is 19%, if it is being sent to ROW it is 0%, but the recipient may have to pay the VAT to receive the it if it is held up at customs in the destination country (this does happen but it is rare).