Massachusetts
Massachusetts doesn't tax residential or commercial cleaning, because its sales tax on services reaches only telecommunications, though items sold to customers apart from the service and itemized separately remain taxable. What does change is on the payroll side: an ABC test for unemployment insurance, a second ABC test in the wage law, state withholding, and a $15.00 minimum wage.
For a Massachusetts cleaning company, sales tax on the cleaning itself is off the table, and worker classification is where the rules get specific. The state applies one ABC test for unemployment insurance and another in its wage law. Below I cover sales tax, both tests, payroll registration, the minimum wage, and what it means for your books.
Residential and commercial cleaning are not taxable in Massachusetts. M.G.L. c. 64H sec. 1 limits taxable services to telecommunications services, and the tax on other services was repealed retroactive to March 6, 1991. Items sold to customers apart from the service, and itemized separately, are still taxable. More on that is on my page on Massachusetts sales tax and cleaning.
Source: Massachusetts Legislature, M.G.L. c. 64H sec. 1, Definitions
Massachusetts uses the ABC test for unemployment insurance, under M.G.L. c. 151A sec. 2. Its wage law has an ABC test too: M.G.L. c. 149 sec. 148B(a) applies to chapter 149 and to chapter 151, the minimum wage law, and its second prong requires the work to be outside the usual course of the employer's business, with no place-of-business alternative. Two tests for one question can sound like a lot. Don't panic. Two statutes. One worker at a time. How each kind of worker shows up in the books is in 1099 subcontractors vs. W-2 employees. Whether a particular cleaner is an employee is a legal question, and it belongs with your CPA or an employment attorney.
Source: Massachusetts Legislature, M.G.L. c. 151A sec. 2
Source: Massachusetts Legislature, M.G.L. c. 149 sec. 148B
Massachusetts taxes wages, and the Massachusetts Department of Revenue handles withholding, with registration through MassTaxConnect. Unemployment insurance is a separate account with the Department of Unemployment Assistance, at its employer registration page.
Source: Massachusetts Department of Revenue, Withholding Tax Guide (posted August 2026)
Source: Massachusetts Department of Revenue, Register your business with MassTaxConnect (May 7, 2026)
The Massachusetts minimum wage is $15.00 an hour under M.G.L. c. 151 sec. 1, effective January 1, 2023. As of October 20, 2026, no change had been announced. Local minimum wages aren't covered on this page.
Source: Massachusetts Legislature, M.G.L. c. 151 sec. 1
Source: U.S. Department of Labor, Wage and Hour Division, State Minimum Wage Laws (July 1, 2026)
With no sales tax on the cleaning itself, Massachusetts bookkeeping leans on payroll and on anything you sell separately. Products sold to a customer as their own itemized line get their own income line, and any sales tax on them sits in a liability account rather than income. Wages go in at the rate you actually pay, recorded against the jobs they belong to. The job profitability estimator shows what that rate does to a single job.
I'm a bookkeeper, not a CPA or an Enrolled Agent. What's taxable, and how it's reported, are questions 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 Massachusetts 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
In Massachusetts the cleaning itself carries no sales tax, so the bookkeeping weight shifts to payroll and to anything sold separately. Wages get recorded at the rate actually paid and tied to the jobs they cover, and separately itemized product sales get their own income line with any tax held as a liability. Book a short call below and we'll look at how your payroll lands in the books.
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
If you clean in Massachusetts and payroll is where your books get tangled, call me up. We'll sort it out together, and the first conversation doesn't cost anything.
