Tax and VAT
Configure your clinic's tax rate, set inclusive vs exclusive pricing, and record exempt patients.
Overview
Healthcare tax handling differs by country. Nigeria charges 7.5% VAT on most services with some healthcare exemptions; Ghana varies by service. The platform supports inclusive (price you display includes VAT) and exclusive (VAT added at checkout) modes.
Prerequisites
- Owner or Admin role
- Knowledge of your country's tax rules for dental services
Steps
Open Financial settings. Settings → Financial.
Set the tax rate. Default Nigeria 7.5%, Ghana 12.5% (sample). Override if your services have a different rate.
Pick tax mode. Inclusive — listed prices already include tax (most patient-facing pricing). Exclusive — listed prices are pre-tax; tax added at checkout (B2B/insurance billing).
Toggle "Tax-exempt patients" feature. When enabled, individual patients can be marked tax-exempt (e.g., charity cases). Their invoices automatically remove tax.
Mark an individual patient tax-exempt. Open the patient profile → Edit → Tax exempt toggle → reason required (charity, government, etc.).
Verify on a draft invoice. Create a test invoice for the exempt patient — tax should be 0. Same invoice for a non-exempt patient should show the tax line.
Configure tax-exempt service codes (optional). Some procedures are statutorily tax-exempt regardless of patient. Settings → CDT Codes → click code → Tax-exempt toggle.
Generate the tax report periodically. Reports → Financial → Tax Report. Aggregates VAT charged and collected, ready for filing.
Expected outcome
- Invoices apply the correct tax rate per setting
- Inclusive vs exclusive renders correctly on patient PDFs
- Tax-exempt cases skip tax with audit trail
- Tax report aggregates accurately for filing
Troubleshooting
| Symptom | Likely cause | Fix |
|---|---|---|
| Tax not applying | Mode is exclusive but no add-on tax line | Switch mode to inclusive, or ensure tax line appears at checkout |
| Wrong rate on some procedures | Service-code-level exemption | Check CDT Codes → Tax-exempt toggle |
| Tax-exempt toggle missing on patient | Feature not enabled tenant-wide | Settings → Financial → Allow per-patient exemption |
| Report numbers off | Refunds reduce taxable amount | Refunds correctly remove tax; report is net |
| Currency formatted wrong | Tenant locale mismatch | Settings → Clinic Profile → Country sets the locale |