Item: Avalara
Rating: 6
Author: Verified User

Overall Satisfaction with Avalara

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

We currently use AvaTax to calculate sales, GST, and VAT taxes. We also use it to file sales tax and Canada GST/HST/PST returns. We currently use it to calculate VAT in the UK, Germany, and Ireland. The problems solved are compliance and filing accurate, timely returns in multiple jurisdictions. We also use it to determine Nexus exposure and tax agency notice resolution.

Pros and Cons

Pros

Import exporting transactions is simple.
Simple user interface.

Cons

Educating you in how their services work together - their reps assume you know tax and their system.
Support, specifically notifications about resolution of state notices.
They make you think they make sales tax easy.

Return on Investment

Calculations are good and reliable. Sometimes they time out and forces our shopping cart to calculate its own rate.
Onboarding and education were sub-optimal.
Backfiling of returns seems slower than it should be.

Implementation Rating

Professional services techs are difficult to schedule. They are hurried because they don't have flexibility if the session runs long. We were frequently scheduling additional sessions and the setup took much longer than anticipated.

Systems Integrated With

Shopify Plus
NetSuite OneWorld

Complex integrations that were difficult because of our needs and the amount of time needed to resolve the integration.

Usability

Avalara forces you to use their documentation which is extensive. However, if you are a beginner you will spend more time getting up to speed with the terminology before you can follow their support. More diagrams of the overall process would be useful.

Additional Capabilities

We expect to use Cert Capture in the coming year as we expand our B2B sales. We are benefiting from return filing services.

Alternatives Considered

TaxJar

TaxJar seems does not seem to be as broad in their service offerings yet.

Likelihood to Recommend

The onboard experience with the NetSuite integration and our global tax onboarding was very difficult. It took an extremely long time for our rep to put us in touch with someone that was even remotely qualified to understand what we needed. Even then, that sales exec was hurried and couldn't help us connect the dots.

Avalara Feature Ratings

Comments

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Bobby Sands
(Vendor Representative) commented 6 years ago
Thank you for taking the time to write about your experience; it’s not the type we aim to deliver. We apologize that the implementation process has been a challenge and we’d like to help. Please contact us at customercare@avalara.com so we can work to address your frustrations.

Cautiously Optimistic

Modules Used