Receipt requirements · OH
Ohio receipt requirements
What a business issuing its own receipts in Ohio needs to show: the rate, whether tax has to be stated separately, which categories are exempt, and whether a written rent receipt is required.
Rates verified: 2026-08-05. Rates change — check your state Department of Revenue before relying on a figure for filing.
Sales tax at a glance
- State rate
- 5.75%
- Combined with local
- 5.75% – 8.25% combined
- Sourcing
- Origin-based — tax follows the seller's location
Does tax have to be separately stated?
Ohio expects the tax stated separately from the price on the receipt. The combined state, county and transit authority rate is what should appear.
Whatever the rule, print it as its own line. Separately stating tax is what lets a reviewer isolate the pre-tax cost, and it is the mechanism most state statutes use to let a seller exclude the tax from gross receipts. The display conventions are covered here.
Exempt and specially rated categories
- Food for off-premises consumption exempt
- Prescription drugs exempt
- Food consumed on the premises is taxable
- Newspapers and magazine subscriptions exempt
A basket that mixes an exempt item with a taxable one needs a per-line tax flag and separate taxable and non-taxable subtotals, or the tax line cannot be checked against the lines it came from.
Rent receipts in Ohio
No statute requires a written rent receipt; a tenant may still request one and most landlords issue one.
The two fields landlords most often omit are the period the payment covers and the unit number. The full field list is here, and the statutory format is in the rent receipt spec.
Worth knowing in Ohio
Ohio's exemption turns on where the food is eaten, not what it is: the same sandwich is exempt to go and taxable eaten in. An Ohio restaurant receipt has to record the dine-in or takeaway choice, because that choice determines whether tax applies at all.