Hi,

If anyone here can shed some light on this dilemma, I'd be more than happy.

I have a business in Sweden selling physical items in a web shop. It's aiming at customers in Scandinavia.
I'm now creating a new similar web shop, but aimed towards customers in USA. To avoid the huge shipping costs and the delay it would be if I sent the items from Sweden to the customers in USA, I have arranged with a manufacturer in USA (in California to be precise) to produce and ship in my name.

It'll work like this:

Customers (visitors at my site) places and order and pays with credit card straight to me and my bank in Sweden. I will then forward the order to the manufacturer in USA. They will produce and ship to customer and then invoice me.

The questions are:

1. Do I need a US tax payer ID? If so; for what purpose?
2. Will I have to add US sales tax? If so, how much?
3. Since the manufacturer is in CA, will customers in CA have to pay extra sales tax?

I have a feeling that there are several questions that I don't even know that I need to ask. I have gone through the IRS website and searched the web for more info, but found nothing. I have also spent some time on phone with the IRS office in London to no avail.

So, if someone could enlighten me about the regulations, what to do and what I am missing (and maybe even point to some relevant sites), that would be terrific.

Cheers
Danny