Receipt requirements · VA
Virginia receipt requirements
What a business issuing its own receipts in Virginia 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
- 4.3%
- Combined with local
- 5.3% – 7% combined
- Sourcing
- Origin-based — tax follows the seller's location
Does tax have to be separately stated?
Virginia expects the tax stated separately from the sale price on the receipt. The 1% local tax is administered with the state tax and is normally shown as part of a single combined rate.
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 and essential personal hygiene items taxed at a reduced rate
- Prescription drugs exempt
- Non-prescription drugs exempt
- Certain agricultural and manufacturing inputs 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 Virginia
A landlord must provide the tenant with a written receipt, upon the tenant's request, whenever the tenant pays rent in the form of cash or a money order.
Authority: Va. Code § 55.1-1204.
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 Virginia
Every Virginia locality levies the 1% local tax, so 5.3% is the floor and no receipt in the state shows the bare 4.3% state rate. Groceries and essential hygiene products drop to a reduced combined rate, which means Virginia supermarket receipts routinely carry two tax lines.