Check for Valid Tax ID blocks entire checkout when VIES webservice is down

[rbrv]

Craft Commerce uses the VIES webservice to check for valid (EU?) VAT numbers.

This service has a habit of going offline for hours, even days on end. When the service is down, the VAT number of a new customer is always marked as invalid.

This makes it impossible for the customer to complete the checkout.

We've tried disabling validateBusinessTaxIdAsVatId, but this resulted in our Tax rate no longer being applied (with 'Don’t apply this tax when the address has a valid VAT ID' set to true).

Additional info

• Craft CMS version: 3.6.16
• Craft Commerce version: 3.3.3

[lukeholder]

@rbrv We are looking into this now. We are looking to improve the messaging to the customer during checkout if the API is down. We will update you more on this issue - so keeping this issue open.

Have you tried Commerce 3.4? There are new VAT tax rate settings.

I think if you set validateBusinessTaxIdAsVatId to false and take a look at the new VAT options in tax rate settings, you might find it could work for you while the API is down.

[rbrv]

@lukeholder Thanks!

We were not able to update to 3.4 yet, as these tax changes (#1881 I'm guessing) also seem to have a major impact. We need time to test these thoroughly before updating.

[karensg]

Once in a while, we experience this error as well. I suggest adding an option to automatically accept a VAT number if VIES is down and eventually flag it in the order for later verification.
Otherwise, the current behavior is to not apply the tax rules. I think that more often than not the client is actually providing a valid VAT number. With an extra option we will have the choice what to do.