Receipt requirements · TX
Texas receipt requirements
What a business issuing its own receipts in Texas 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
- 6.25%
- Combined with local
- 6.25% – 8.25% combined
- Sourcing
- Origin-based — tax follows the seller's location
Does tax have to be separately stated?
Texas requires the tax to be separately stated on the invoice, bill or receipt, or the seller must post a sign that the price includes tax. A seller who does neither is treated as having absorbed the tax, which is not permitted.
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
- Groceries for home consumption exempt
- Prescription and over-the-counter drugs exempt
- Bakery items exempt when sold without eating utensils
- Most professional services 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 Texas
A landlord who receives a cash rental payment must give the tenant a written receipt and enter the date and amount of the payment in a record book. A tenant who prevails in a suit over a violation may recover the greater of one month's rent or $500 per violation.
Authority: Tex. Prop. Code § 92.011.
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 Texas
Local rates are capped at 2%, so no Texas receipt exceeds 8.25% — but that cap is shared across city, county, transit and special district taxes, which is why some suburbs collect less than the city next door. On the rental side, the cash-rent receipt duty comes with a statutory penalty, so it is worth doing properly.