The Indiana ST-103 sales and use tax voucher is the return every registered retail merchant files electronically through INTIME to report gross sales, remit the 7% state sales tax collected from customers, and pay use tax on untaxed purchases the business consumed itself. The form has eleven lines, and it must be filed for every reporting period assigned to your account, even when no tax is due.
Who Has to File
If you hold an Indiana Registered Retail Merchant Certificate and sell tangible personal property, digital products, or taxable services in Indiana, you file an ST-103 for every period on your schedule.1Indiana General Assembly. Indiana Code 6-2.5-6-1 – Returns, Reporting Period, Online Tax A period with zero taxable sales is not a period you can skip. The return still has to be submitted, or the state assesses a penalty for the missed filing. If the business has permanently stopped selling, close the tax account with DOR instead of quietly halting returns.
Filling Out the ST-103 Line by Line
Before you log in, pull your sales records for the period, every exemption certificate a buyer gave you, and invoices for anything you bought without paying sales tax. INTIME will do the arithmetic once you enter the figures, but the numbers still have to come from your books.2Indiana Department of Revenue. Instructions for Completing Form ST-103
Line 1 — Total Sales
Enter gross sales for the reporting period: retail, wholesale, manufacturing, and out-of-state sales all belong here. This line captures everything, not just taxable transactions, and it covers only the current period. Do not fold in figures from earlier or later returns.
Line 2 — Exemptions and Deductions
Add up sales you are legally allowed to remove from the taxable base. That includes sales to buyers who handed you a valid exemption certificate (Form ST-105 for resale and other standard exemptions, Form ST-108E for other exempt buyers), sales shipped out of state, and bad debts written off during the period.
Line 3 — Excluded Sales
Enter sales where someone else is responsible for collecting the tax. The most common case is sales made through a marketplace facilitator that collects Indiana sales tax on your behalf.
Line 4 — Taxable Sales
Add Lines 2 and 3, then subtract that combined figure from Line 1. What remains is your net taxable sales.
Line 5 — Total Tax Due
Multiply Line 4 by 0.07. Indiana’s state sales tax rate is a flat 7%, with no local add-ons.3Indiana Department of Revenue. Sales Tax
Line 6 — Collection Allowance
If your return and payment are on time, you keep a small percentage of the tax as a collection allowance. DOR calculates your rate and prints it on the return itself. See the next section for how the percentages work.
Line 7 — Use Tax Due
Report use tax on any tangible property you bought without paying sales tax and then used in the business rather than reselling. Multiply the original cost of those items by 0.07. Common triggers are inventory pulled for personal use, giveaways, and stock converted into display models no longer for sale.
Line 8 — Interest
If you are paying after the due date, calculate interest on Lines 5 and 7 combined. Take the amount owed, multiply by the annual interest rate, divide by 365, and multiply by the number of days late. DOR publishes the current annual rate in Departmental Notice #3.
Line 9 — Penalty
Late payment carries a penalty of 10% of Lines 5 plus 7, or $5, whichever is greater. If DOR already sent you a Notice of Failure to File for the period, the penalty doubles to 20%.
Line 10 — Payment Previously Made
Enter anything you already paid for this period by electronic funds transfer.
Line 11 — Amount Due
Add Lines 5, 7, 8, and 9, then subtract Lines 6 and 10. That is what you owe with the return.
How the Collection Allowance Works
The collection allowance on Line 6 is Indiana’s small reward for filing and paying on time. Your rate depends on total sales and use tax accrued during the state fiscal year ending June 30 of the preceding calendar year.4Indiana General Assembly. Indiana Code 6-2.5-6-10 – Tax Liability, Merchants Collection
- $60,000 or less: 0.73%
- More than $60,000 but not more than $600,000: 0.53%
- More than $600,000: 0.26%
DOR assigns the rate and prints it on the return, so you do not calculate it yourself. Miss the due date by any margin and you forfeit the allowance for that period. There is no partial credit for being a few days late.
Filing Frequency and Due Dates
DOR sets your filing schedule based on your average monthly sales tax liability during the state fiscal year ending June 30 of the prior calendar year.5Indiana Department of Revenue. Filing Deadlines
- Early filers, averaging $1,000 or more per month: due by the 20th of the month after the reporting period.
- Monthly filers, averaging under $1,000 per month: due by the 30th of the month after the reporting period.
Merchants whose total sales tax liability in the prior calendar year was $1,000 or less may be approved for annual filing, with the return due by the last day of the month following the close of the reporting period.1Indiana General Assembly. Indiana Code 6-2.5-6-1 – Returns, Reporting Period, Online Tax DOR can approve other non-standard schedules, such as quarterly filing, but only on request. If your volume shifts enough during the year, DOR may reclassify you and will notify you before the change takes effect.
Submitting Through INTIME
ST-103 returns must be filed electronically. Paper is not accepted.6Indiana Department of Revenue. INTIME If you do not already have an INTIME account, register at intime.dor.in.gov using your ten-digit Indiana Taxpayer Identification Number.
Once logged in, open the Returns tab and select the period you are filing. INTIME shows a pending ST-103 for each open period. Enter your figures line by line; the portal applies your collection allowance rate, calculates the tax, and shows the total owed. Review the summary against your own records before you move to payment.
Two payment methods are available. ACH debit pulls the funds from a linked bank account at no charge. Credit and debit card payments carry a processing fee of $1 plus 1.99% of the payment amount for Visa, Mastercard, and Discover.7Indiana Department of Revenue. INTIME for Individual Income Tax Customers User Guide On a $5,000 payment, that comes out to roughly $100, so ACH is cheaper for most businesses.
After submission, INTIME issues a confirmation number and a digital receipt with the timestamp and authorized amount. Save it. That receipt is your proof of filing.
Getting Line 7 Right: Use Tax
Line 7 is where most merchants slip up. If you bought supplies, equipment, or other tangible property without paying Indiana sales tax and then used it in the business instead of reselling it, you owe use tax at 7%.2Indiana Department of Revenue. Instructions for Completing Form ST-103 Out-of-state vendors, online purchases, and inventory bought under a resale certificate all commonly produce use tax when the item ends up staying with the business.
The three situations that come up most often are inventory pulled for personal use, products given away as promotional items, and stock converted into display models. Multiply the item’s original cost by 0.07 and add the result to Line 7. Track these conversions as they happen; reconstructing them at filing time is where auditors find underreporting.
Handling Marketplace Sales on Line 3
If you sell through Amazon, Etsy, Walmart Marketplace, or another platform that meets Indiana’s economic nexus threshold, the platform collects and remits sales tax on those transactions.8Indiana Department of Revenue. Sales Tax Information Bulletin 89 Those sales still belong in your Line 1 gross total, but they go on Line 3 as excluded sales rather than Line 2 as exemptions. Subtracting them on Line 3 keeps you from paying tax the marketplace already collected. Keep records showing which sales were facilitated and which you handled directly. This is one of the more common discrepancies auditors flag.
Exemption Certificates and Recordkeeping
Any sale you deduct on Line 2 as exempt needs a completed exemption certificate on file at the time of the sale. The forms you will use most are the ST-105 (General Sales Tax Exemption Certificate) for resale and other standard exemptions, and the ST-105D (Dealer-to-Dealer Resale Certificate) for transactions between dealers. Indiana also accepts the multistate Streamlined Sales and Use Tax Certificate of Exemption (SSTGB Form F0003).9Indiana Department of Revenue. Sales Tax Forms
Retain certificates and the books and records supporting your returns for at least three years after the final payment for that period was due.10Indiana General Assembly. Indiana Code 6-8.1-5-4 – Books and Records, Federal Returns If you never filed a return for a period, or DOR suspects a fraudulent filing, the retention requirement becomes unlimited. Keeping records four years gives some cushion for audits that open near the end of the window.
Penalties for Filing Late
Indiana imposes separate consequences for filing late and paying late, and they can stack.
- Late payment penalty: 10% of Lines 5 plus 7, or $5, whichever is greater. If you file after receiving a Notice of Failure to File, the penalty rises to 20%.2Indiana Department of Revenue. Instructions for Completing Form ST-103
- Late filing with no tax owed: $10 per day past the due date, up to a $250 maximum. Owing zero does not exempt you from the return itself.11Indiana Department of Revenue. Fines, Fees and Penalties
- Interest: accrues daily on the unpaid balance from the due date until paid, at the annual rate published in Departmental Notice #3.
DOR can waive penalties when the failure was not due to willful neglect.12Justia Law. Indiana Code 6-8.1-10 – Penalties and Interest Genuine reasonable cause, such as a natural disaster, serious illness, or a system outage that blocked electronic filing, can support a waiver. Forgetting or not knowing about the requirement will not. Submit the request in writing through INTIME or by contacting DOR, and include documentation.