Saturday, November 2, 2024

Don’t forget: Virginia’s tax holiday is this weekend

(WYDaily file photo/Adobe)
(WYDaily file photo/Adobe)

Although several area schools opting for remote learning the first weeks of the school year, educational supplies are still necessities.

And this is the weekend to shop for them.

Virginia’s annual tax holiday began at 12:01 a.m. Friday (Aug. 7) and runs through 11:59 p.m. Sunday (Aug. 9). During that period, sales tax won’t be tacked onto purchases of eligible items.

During the sales tax holiday, shoppers can buy qualifying school supplies, clothing, footwear, hurricane and emergency preparedness items, and Energy Star™ and WaterSense™ products without paying sales tax.

The National Federation of Independent Businesses is encouraging people to shop local during the tax holiday.

“This has been a challenging spring and summer for local retailers struggling to recover from the economic shutdown and a great time to support them as they do come back,” said NFIB’s Virginia State Director Nicole Riley. “Not only did small business owners lose a lot of revenue in recent months, but they also had to spend additional dollars to pay for equipment and supplies to protect customers and employees from the coronavirus when reopening.”

What items are eligible? Here’s the list from the Virginia Department of Taxation:

School supplies, clothing and footwear

  • School supplies: $20 or less per item.
  • Clothing and footwear: $100 or less per item.

Hurricane and emergency preparedness products

  • Portable generators: $1,000 or less per item.
  • Gas-powered chainsaws: $350 or less per item.
  • Chainsaw accessories: $60 or less per item.
  • Other specified hurricane preparedness items: $60 or less per item.

Energy Star and WaterSense​ products

  • Qualifying Energy Star or WaterSense products (must be purchased for noncommercial or personal use): $2,500 or less per item.

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John Mangalonzo
John Mangalonzohttp://wydaily.com
John Mangalonzo (john@localdailymedia.com) is the managing editor of Local Voice Media’s Virginia papers – WYDaily (Williamsburg), Southside Daily (Virginia Beach) and HNNDaily (Hampton-Newport News). Before coming to Local Voice, John was the senior content editor of The Bellingham Herald, a McClatchy newspaper in Washington state. Previously, he served as city editor/content strategist for USA Today Network newsrooms in St. George and Cedar City, Utah. John started his professional journalism career shortly after graduating from Lyceum of The Philippines University in 1990. As a rookie reporter for a national newspaper in Manila that year, John was assigned to cover four of the most dangerous cities in Metro Manila. Later that year, John was transferred to cover the Philippine National Police and Armed Forces of the Philippines. He spent the latter part of 1990 to early 1992 embedded with troopers in the southern Philippines as they fought with communist rebels and Muslim extremists. His U.S. journalism career includes reporting and editing stints for newspapers and other media outlets in New York City, California, Texas, Iowa, Utah, Colorado and Washington state.

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