Jacksonville, Florida
Duval County's 1.5% discretionary sales surtax, added to Florida's 6%, puts taxable commercial cleaning in Jacksonville at 7.5%. Residential cleaning isn't taxable in Florida, and neither are carpet cleaning or exterior pressure washing. Anyone owning or operating a business in Jacksonville and Duval County also needs a Local Business Tax Receipt.
The Duval surtax has been built up since 1989, one half percent at a time. This page lays out the three pieces, the business tax receipt, which jobs the tax touches, and how I keep the books on it.
Form DR-15DSS for calendar year 2026 lists three 0.5% surtaxes for Duval County. The oldest took effect January 1, 1989 and has no expiration. The second took effect January 1, 2001 and expires December 31, 2030. The third took effect January 1, 2021 and expires December 31, 2035. Together they're 1.5%, and Florida's 6% state rate brings the total to 7.5%, the same total my Tampa page shows for Hillsborough County from three different surtaxes.
Source: Florida Department of Revenue, Sales and Use Tax
The Duval County Tax Collector's page says a Local Business Tax Receipt is required for anyone owning or operating a business in Jacksonville/Duval County, and the Local Business Tax Office of the Duval County Tax Collector handles it.
Source: Duval County Tax Collector (City of Jacksonville), Local Business Tax Receipt (LBTR)
Cleaning nonresidential interiors, including janitorial, maid, and window cleaning, is taxable in Florida per the Department of Revenue's brochure GT-800015, and window cleaning of nonresidential buildings is taxable inside or out. Homes aren't. Carpet cleaning and exterior pressure washing aren't. The surtax applies at the rate of the county where the service is performed. The rest is on my Florida sales tax page.
Source: Florida Department of Revenue, Sales and Use Tax on Cleaning Services (GT-800015, R. 09/22)
Taxable commercial work and non-taxable work stay on separate income lines, and each taxable invoice records the county where the job was done. Collected tax sits in a liability account. Every single number in that liability should trace back to an invoice, and that's the first thing I check at month end. The receipt is recorded when it's paid. Payroll and reemployment tax are on my Florida page.
I'm a bookkeeper, not a CPA or an Enrolled Agent. Whether a job is taxable, and how the surtax is reported, is a question for your CPA.
Rules checked against the sources above as of October 20, 2026. Rates and rules change; confirm current figures with the agency or your CPA.
About Figure Eight Financial
Figure Eight Financial is Dave Gordon’s bookkeeping practice for residential and commercial cleaning companies. I work with owners in Jacksonville and across the country, and I’m a Certified QuickBooks Online ProAdvisor.
Before bookkeeping I studied computer science at Penn State and spent a career at IBM as an engineer, so I build the books as a system: data comes in once, lands in the right place, and ties back to a statement. I’m a bookkeeper, not a CPA or Enrolled Agent. I keep the books your CPA works from, and the tax decisions stay with your CPA.
Credentials and memberships reported by Figure Eight Financial.
More about DaveHow I Help
Two local items shape a Jacksonville cleaning business on this page: Duval County's 1.5% surtax on taxable commercial work and the Local Business Tax Receipt. Taxable and non-taxable jobs sit on separate income lines, collected tax is held as a liability that ties back to invoices, and the receipt is recorded when it's paid. Book a short call below and tell me about your Jacksonville work.
The core service. Transactions recorded and categorized, every account reconciled so the books and the bank agree, and monthly reports that arrive explained, split by residential and commercial and sliceable per contract.
The full picture of how this works for a cleaning companyFor the months where nothing got entered at all. I fill in the missing periods from the ground up, pulling bank feeds, statements, and receipts until every month has a complete set of records.
How catch-up bookkeeping worksFor books that exist but can’t be trusted. I audit what’s there, fix the unreconciled accounts, duplicate transactions, and wrong categories, and tie every balance back to a statement.
How cleanup bookkeeping worksYour crews paid on time, every pay period, with each payroll run recorded in the books so labor shows up against the jobs it belongs to.
How payroll worksRecurring invoices that match your contracts, an aging report you can trust, and follow-up on slow payers handled by a process instead of your evenings. Built for net-60 commercial accounts.
How invoicing and receivables workA file built right for a cleaning company from day one, or rebuilt after the DIY version drifts, and then I teach you to run it. I’m a Certified QuickBooks Online ProAdvisor, and this is honestly my favorite part of the job.
How a proper setup worksWe start with a short call about your business and where the books stand. The first conversation doesn’t cost anything.
I take a look at what you’ve got, your QuickBooks file, your spreadsheet, whatever exists.
You get a written proposal with the price, so the decision is yours with the number in hand.
Let's Connect
Cleaning in Jacksonville and want the surtax and the receipt kept straight? Tell me how your books handle them today. The first conversation doesn't cost anything.
