Show HN: TaxLens – free lodging-tax API for hotels, OTAs, and property managers

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TaxLens — Accommodation Tax Infrastructure

Accommodation tax infrastructure for every stay<br>Calculate, persist booking evidence, issue invoices, report liabilities, and monitor regulatory change across every lodging-tax workflow.<br>Sign up Guides

tax decision packet<br>US-NY-NYC / 3 nights / hotel

$87.37<br>tax due

NY state

$30.00

NYC occupancy

$44.06

Fees

$10.50

snapshot<br>invoice<br>report

245<br>countries/territories

1,100+<br>active rates

700+<br>rules/exemptions

1,000+<br>jurisdictions

prefers-reduced-motion supported: motion pauses for reduced-motion users.tax decision packet<br>US-NY-NYC / hotel / Jun 15 to Jun 18

Booking input<br>New York City stay<br>3 nights / 2 guests / hotel

Room base<br>$750.00

Stay date<br>2026-06-15

Resolved jurisdiction<br>US / New York / New York City<br>country, state, city, special lodging rules

Tax due<br>$87.37

11.65%<br>effective

Additive tax stack<br>4 visible layers

NY state sales tax

US-NY / 4.00%

$30.00

NYC occupancy

US-NY-NYC / 5.875%

$44.06

Unit fee + convention

US-NY-NYC / nightly

$10.50

Municipal layer

US-NY-NYC / 0.375%

$2.81

Calculation<br>calc_8b4f21<br>6 component stack

Snapshot<br>book_1542<br>frozen evidence

Finance<br>invoice + report<br>same source record

Tax lifecycle<br>TaxLens is not just a calculation endpoint. It carries the same tax decision from quote to booking evidence, invoice issuance, liability reporting, and regulatory monitoring.

One booking record<br>TL-BOOKING-1542 / immutable fiscal chain

Calculate<br>tax_breakdown.json

jurisdiction resolved, component stack returned

Persist<br>booking_snapshot

request, response, property drivers, issuer defaults

Issue<br>invoice document

commercial invoice, credit note, self-billing basis

Report<br>liability extract

issued period, authority, category, amount

Monitor<br>change proposal

source change detected before approval

01<br>Quote the stay<br>Calculate<br>Resolve the jurisdiction, stack every applicable tax layer, and return a deterministic breakdown before checkout.

02<br>Freeze the evidence<br>Persist<br>Store the confirmed booking, idempotency key, buyer context, and immutable tax snapshot for downstream finance work.

03<br>Create fiscal documents<br>Issue<br>Project the booking into commercial invoices, self-billing flows, credit notes, and UBL/XML-ready documents.

04<br>Reconcile liability<br>Report<br>Pull period liability reports from issued invoice snapshots so tax teams can remit by jurisdiction and category.

05<br>Keep rules current<br>Monitor<br>AI monitoring detects source changes, while human review approves updates with authority names and legal references.

Who TaxLens helps<br>The same platform supports different buyers because lodging tax risk appears in different parts of the operating model.

OTAs & marketplaces<br>Booking.com, Airbnb-style platforms, bedbanks, and merchant-of-record flows.<br>Route marketplace facilitator, merchant-of-record, commission VAT, and self-billing scenarios without separate tax logic per channel.<br>Reduce launch friction when adding new jurisdictions or supplier models.<br>merchant-of-record and channel context travel with each calculation.

Hotel groups<br>Multi-property brands and regional hotel operators.<br>Give front-desk and finance teams one source of truth for quotes, invoices, credit notes, and monthly liability reporting.<br>Cut manual spreadsheet review before close and reduce under/over-collection risk.<br>booking snapshots keep historical invoices stable after rule changes.

PMS & property managers<br>Property managers, channel managers, and PMS platforms with many units.<br>Map every unit once, inherit property tax drivers, and calculate stay tax consistently across direct, OTA, and owner channels.<br>Ship compliant tax workflows without building local rules into the PMS.<br>property defaults fill booking inputs without rewriting historical records.

A platform built around the hard parts<br>Rates are only the visible edge. TaxLens connects address resolution, additive tax logic, booking evidence, fiscal documents, and reporting into one operating layer.

address -> code<br>Jurisdiction resolution<br>Use a known jurisdiction code or resolve an address into the country, state, city, district, and special-zone path.

additive stack<br>Layered tax engine<br>Country, regional, city, and district rates fire independently so remittance lines remain separate and auditable.

frozen evidence<br>Booking snapshots<br>Confirmed bookings preserve the exact tax response, property drivers, buyer context, and issuer defaults used at sale time.

380 / 381 / 389<br>E-invoicing system of record<br>Issue commercial invoices, self-billed invoices, and credit notes with legal issuer fields and UBL/XML output.

issued period<br>Liability reporting<br>Report tax liability from issued invoice snapshots, not recalculated bookings, so finance sees stable remittance numbers.

approval queue<br>Human-reviewed monitoring<br>Monitoring agents propose rate changes; reviewers approve drafts with source URLs, authority names, and legal references.

Show the hard cases, then keep the evidence<br>One request shape handles percentage...

booking property evidence invoice liability invoices

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