Set up a Magento store for New Zealand

Magento is a robust E-commerce platform that comes with a lot of configuration options so sometimes it can be a bit overwhelming for new store owners or developers to set it up correctly. We will walk through the 3 things that we need to do to set up the Magento store specifically for New Zealand.

1. Set up system configurations for New Zealand

System > Configuration > General

Countries Options

Default Country = New Zealand

Allow Countries = Select all countries that you sell your product to

Locale Options

TimeZone = New Zealand Standard Time (Pacific/Auckland)

Locale = English(New Zealand)

System > Configuration > Currency Setup

Currency Options

Base Currency = New Zealand Dollar

Default Display Currency = New Zealand Dollar

Allowed Currencies = Select New Zealand Dollar

System > Configuration > Shipping Settings

Origin

Country = New Zealand

System > Configuration > Tax

Tax Classes

Tax Class for Shipping = Taxable Goods

Calculation Settings

Tax Calculation Method Based On = Total

Tax Calculation Based on = Shipping Address

Catalog Prices = Including Tax (this means the product price you entered in Magento backend includes tax)

Shipping Prices = Including Tax

Apply Discount On Prices = Including Tax

Apply Tax On = Custom Price if available

Enable Cross Border Trade = Yes (this means if someone buys your products from overseas instead of deducting the GST amount from the sale price, GST will be calculated as 0 while the sale price is kept at the same)

Default Tax Destination Calculation

Default Country = New Zealand

Default State = *

Default Post Code = *

Price Display Settings

Display Product Prices in Catalog = Including Tax

Display Shipping Prices = Including Tax

Shopping Cart Display Settings

Display Prices = Including Tax

Display Subtotal = Including Tax

Display Shipping Amount = Including Tax

Include Tax In Grand Total = No

Display Full Tax Summary = No

Display Zero Tax Subtotal = No

Orders,Invoices,Credit Memos Display Settings

Display Prices = Including Tax

Display Subtotal = Including Tax

Display Shipping Amount = Including Tax

Include Tax in Grand Total = No

Display Full Tax Summary = No

Display Zero Tax Subtotal = No

2. Set up New Zealand tax rates and rules (GST)

Sales > Tax > Manage Tax Zones & Rates

Click on Add New Tax Rate

Tax Identifier = gst

Country = New Zealand

State = *

Zip/Post is Range = No

Zip/Post Code = *

Rate Percent = 15

Typically a shop in New Zealand will only charge one type of tax (GST) to its customers, so you will first need to remove all other tax rates.

Sales > Tax > Manage Tax Rules

Click on “Add New Tax Rule”

Name = GST

Customer Tax Class = Select all

Product Tax Class = Select all

Tax Rate = gst <- the one we just created

Again, you will need to remove all other tax rules

3. Rename the word “Tax” To “GST” for display

We can achieve this by using the translation feature that comes with Magento. To modify the translation, go to app/locale under your Magento directory and create a folder called en_NZ. copy the file Mage_Sales.csv from the app/locale/en_US folder into the en_NZ folder. Open the file and identify the line with content : “Tax”,”Tax” Change the second “Tax” to “GST”

After this you will need to clear the Magento translation cache. To do this go to System > Cache Management, tick Translations then click on submit.