Updated: September 25, 2025 8:43am

Tax Rebates (VAT)
Tourists and businesspeople who visit VAT countries are entitled to refunds on the VAT paid, subject to local rules and regulations. Typically, customers must shop at stores that offer VAT refunds and show a passport when making the purchase. The local regulations may require the purchase to be above a certain threshold amount. When tax rebates are enabled in Prism and receipt designs are configured correctly, Prism will include the rebate info on a receipt so the customer can apply for a refund. 

Basic Steps for Using Tax Rebates in RP Prism
1. Create a special tax code (e.g., called "Rebate"). Add a special Tax Rule to the store's Tax Area for the tax code. Be sure to select the Rebate checkbox for the Tax Rule.
2. Select the "Allow Tax Rebate" flag in in Admin Console > Node Preferences > Taxes > General. Specify a default rebate percentage and threshold amount.
3. Assign the appropriate Tax Code to each item that will be eligible for rebates.
4. Assign permissions related to tax rebates to employee groups. 
5. Ensure that the document designs used for printing receipts include the document-level tax rebate fields.
6. At POS, use the Transaction Details dialog to designate the tax rebate amount. The rebate amount will be included on the printed receipt.

Create a special tax code (e.g., called "Rebate")
Add a  Tax Rule to the store's Tax Area for the tax code. Be sure to select the Rebate checkbox for the Tax Rule.
Tax rule for rebate
Enable Tax Rebates in Admin Console > Node Preferences > Taxes > General. Specify a default rebate percentage and threshold amount. Check your local VAT rebate regulations to determine what values should be entered for the rebate percentage and threshold amount.

tax rebate preferences
Assign the appropriate Tax Code to each item that will be eligible for rebates.
Inventory item assigned rebate tax code
Assign permissions related to tax rebates to employee groups.

tax rebate permissions

Add Document-level Rebate Fields to Receipt Designs

tax rebate amount field in document designer
At POS, use the Transaction Details dialog to apply the rebate and optionally change the rebate amount.
Tax rebate 20 percent

Persisted vs. Non-Persisted
Selecting the Persist button will apply the rebate percentage to qualifying items as the transaction is changed. When enabled, the Tax Rebate Amount becomes read-only; however, if items are added later, the Tax Rebate Amount will be recalculated. There are three possible settings for the Persisted field: 0 = no tax rebate applied, 2 =tax rebate applied, 3 = tax rebate applied and persisted.

Adding Items after applying Tax Rebate
If you add items to a transaction after applying a tax rebate, if the rebate is persistent, then the tax rebate amount will be recalculated.

Tax Rebate Example
Note: A key consideration when configuring tax rebates is to set the correct Tax Rebate Percentage. The tax rebate percentage that you enter in preferences is not the percentage of the tax to be rebated, but rather the percentage of the price. Therefore, you don't want to set the tax rebate percentage to be higher than the tax rate.
You can optionally enter a Tax Rebate Threshold. This is the amount of tax that must be rebated
Tax Rebate Settings
In Node Preferences > Taxes > General, the Tax Method is set to "VAT" and the "Allow Tax Rebate" option is enabled. The Default Tax Rebate Percentage is set to 20 percent, which is the same as the rate in our S1TAXAREA1 tax area.
The Tax Rebate Threshold Amount is set to 25. This means that the Tax Rebate button in Transaction Details will be disabled unless the transaction total is 25.00 or more.
Example rebate prefs
 S1TAXAREA1 is the tax area for Store 001. There is a Tax Code called Rebate. The S1TAXAREA1 has a rule named "REBATE" for the "REBATE" Tax Code. In that rule, the Rebate checkbox is selected the rate is set at 20% the VAT rate or that locale).
 Rebate tax rule
In the example S1TAXAREA1 tax area, the Rebate tax rule has a Threshold of 0 and a Rate of 20. This means it will apply to transactions from 0.00 on up and apply a VAT rate of 20 percent. The Tax Rebate feature only applies to items that are assigned a Tax Code that is a "rebate" tax code. In Inventory, the "REBATE" Tax code is assigned to item with UPC 00000000017
Inventory item with rebate tax code
A new transaction is started at a store that uses the S1TAXAREA1 tax area and the tax-rebate eligible item is listed.
 Rebate item transaction
Click Transaction Details.
Click the Taxes tab and scroll down to the "Tax Rebates" area. Initially, the Tax Rebate % and Tax Rebate Amount fields are empty.
Rebate fields before applying rebate
Click the Rebate button. The rebate percentage defined in preferences is applied the transaction. In this case, the rebate percentage of 20 percentage was applied to the transaction and the resulting rebate amount is 2.00
 Tax rebate 20 percent
Note: If you remove the item that has the Rebate tax code, or if the Threshold defined in preferences is not met, you will get an error message.
Note: If the item(s) listed do not reach the Threshold defined in Node Preferences > System > Sublocations, the Rebate button will be disabled.