A Press Release From - Barnett Marketing Communications

For Immediate Release              For More Information, Contact: Ned Barnett 

Avalara Reveals On-Demand Sales Tax Calculation Service For Microsoft Navision and Small Business Financials

Eliminates Sales Tax Hassles and Reduces Audit Risk for Small and Medium Businesses

San Diego, California – March 6, 2005: Avalara, the on-demand sales and use tax solution provider serving small and medium businesses with integrated ERP solutions, today unveiled its new interface for AvaTax ST within Navision and Small Business Financials, two of Microsoft’s widely-used accounting packages.  Exhibiting as a gold-level sponsor at Microsoft-sponsored Convergence this week, Avalara is marking the occasion with previews of multiple new Microsoft integrations.

“AvaTax ST for Navision and Small Business Financials will be our second and third integrations with Microsoft Business Solutions accounting packages.  Alongside our existing Great Plains 8.0, 7.5 and 7.0 editions, these introductions signify our continued commitment to businesses using Microsoft Business Solutions products by addressing their need to deal with sales and use tax in a way that’s accurate, affordable, and with the convenience of operating within tools they already rely on,” explained Rory Rawlings, Avalara’s President and founder.  “We are proud to be demonstrating how simply and powerfully AvaTax ST does its job of automating sales tax compliance within Navision and Small Business Financials at Convergence, an important event to the business community and the industry.”

“AvaTax ST works behind the scenes in more ERPs than any other sales tax solution,” noted Ranjit Mulgaonkar, Avalara’s VP Product Management and Business Development.  “Without leaving the customer order screen, the user is able to instantly validate the customer’s address to confirm and identify exact street location, perform critical jurisdiction research and tax calculation against that location for each of the more than 8,000 sales taxing jurisdictions in the US, and generate detailed reporting that exceeds audit requirements.  With planned new functionality to also automate tax returns generation, in total, this offers businesses a total, end-to-end tax compliance solution, saving hours of businesses’ valuable time, ensuring accuracy, and helping them avoid the cost and nuisance of sales tax audits.”

“For small and medium businesses,” continued Mulgaonkar, “especially those selling into multiple states or jurisdictions, this is significant: instead of researching and assigning each customer to a specific tax schedule, one single schedule applies to all customers: AvaTax. Each AvaTax calculation takes into account the complex dimensions of sales tax, including customer exemptions, product taxabilities, and sourcing rules.  Those hassles, and the manual, error-prone processes businesses often employ to deal with them, are removed for the business, for good.”

“Web-service solutions, such as AvaTax ST, offer small and mid-sized businesses flexible, on-demand services at a fraction of the price of purchasing and updating software in-house.  Dealing with sales and use tax creates costs to businesses that have no strategic value other than fulfillment of a statutory requirement, and we eliminate that cost – replacing it with a cost-saving benefit that drops directly to the bottom line.” AvaTax ST monthly subscription prices start at $99.95 per month.”

About AvaTax ST
AvaTax ST is the fastest, easiest, most accurate and affordable way to calculate and report sales and use taxes. It reflects Avalara’s commitment to deliver best practices in sales and use tax compliance, improved internal controls, and simply the best end-user experience.

AvaTax ST currently integrates with more third party financial packages than any other sales and use tax solution, including AvaTax ST for Microsoft’s Great Plains, Microsoft Commerce Server systems, Best Software’s ACCPAC Advantage Series™, Best Software’s MAS 90® and MAS 200®, and Scala, among others. More, significant integrations with commonly-used ERPs will be released in Q2 and Q3. Available through resellers internationally, AvaTax ST is priced on a scalable fee structure, to accommodate any size business.

About AutoAddress+
As with Avalara’s flagship product, AvaTax ST, Avalara’s AutoAddress+ is a hosted, Internet-based web service that performs address validation in real-time over a secure SSL internet connection. AutoAddress+ transparently connects the customer address record to Avalara's real-time database of U.S. Postal Service CASS Certified valid addresses.  AutoAddress+ compares the contact record with USPS formatting, and inserts the correct address back into the customer record – two features essential for effective end-user access to the Postal Service’s lowest-cost delivery systems.

Along with AvaTax ST for Navision and Small Business Financials, Avalara is also previewing AutoAddress+ for Microsoft CRM at Convergence this week.  AutoAddress+ currently comes integrated within Best Software’s ACCPAC CRM®, and can be integrated with any accounting, ERP, e-commerce system or custom application.  Monthly subscription fees start at $49.95 per month.

About Avalara
Headquartered on Bainbridge Island near Seattle, Washington, Avalara is changing the sales and use tax landscape by delivering innovative and affordable solutions. Led by a team of industry experts in sales and use tax, and security and information technology, Avalara's goal is to provide the easiest, most accurate and affordable way for any sized company to address all statutory sales and use tax requirements.  Avalara is a Microsoft Certified Partner.

For more information about Avalara, or to interview one of the Avalara principals, please contact Ned Barnett, Barnett Marketing Communications – 702-696-1200 or ned@barnettmarcom.com.