HIP-1338: Tax — Informational Returns, Tax Profiles & Form 1099 Compliance

Abstract

Package tax (/v1/tax) governs how organizations and entities operating on Hanzo commerce rails exchange tax identification profiles (Form W-9, Form W-8BEN, Form W-8BEN-E), classify transactions, prepare informational returns (Form 1099-NEC, Form 1099-MISC), and generate electronic submission bundles for tax compliance.

This proposal specifies the dual payer/payee model, cryptographic sealing of Taxpayer Identification Numbers (TINs) via Hanzo KMS, and cross-organization grant protocols.

Motivation

Autonomous agentic commerce, headless payments, and marketplace transactions generate complex reporting obligations across multiple jurisdictions. Companies transacting on Hanzo rails must furnish annual Copy B statements to payees and report payments to tax authorities.

Storing unencrypted TINs or relying on third-party SaaS tax processors introduces catastrophic data leakage risks. Furthermore, manual collection of W-9 forms creates operational friction that stalls agent transactions. A sovereign, self-contained tax subsystem is required to automate transaction classification, seal credentials under organization KMS master keys, and provide verifiable audit trails.

Specification

The key words MUST, MUST NOT, SHOULD, SHOULD NOT and MAY are to be interpreted as in RFC 2119.

1. Dual Payer / Payee Architecture

Every organization formed on Hanzo functions in dual roles:

• As Payee: Maintains a single active tax profile (W-9 for domestic U.S. persons; W-8BEN / W-8BEN-E for foreign individuals and entities). Controls which payers are granted access to read certification details and receives furnished Copy B statements in its inbox.
• As Payer: Requests counterparty tax documentation, ingests settled transactions from the event and ledger plane (hanzoai/ledger, hanzoai/treasury), classifies reportable amounts, drafts 1099-NEC / 1099-MISC returns for payees exceeding annual thresholds, and exports the IRS IRIS transmission bundle.

2. TIN Encryption via Hanzo KMS

• Taxpayer Identification Numbers (SSN, EIN, ITIN) MUST be sealed under the organization's dedicated KMS master key (newSealer(deps.MasterKey)).
• Plaintext TINs MUST NOT be logged or returned in general member queries.
• SuperAdmin accounts MUST NOT be permitted to read plaintext TINs or execute W-9 signature certifications; only the organization's verified administrator may certify tax profiles.

3. Inter-Organization Grant Protocol

• Reading another organization's tax documentation requires an explicit cryptographic grant recorded in the payee's encrypted database.
• Grants are revocable at any time by the payee administrator.
• Queries spanning counterparties are routed strictly to the elected writer replica to guarantee immediate consistency upon grant revocation.

4. HTTP Endpoints