For adult subscription sites and clip stores with members billed in Chicago

Chicago taxes the stream. 10.25% of every member there.

Lakeshore reads your payment processor’s charges export in the browser, finds the charges billed in Chicago, takes off their refunds, and builds each month’s Form 7510 figures: taxable amount, 10.25%, tax charged to members and any shortfall. Only the monthly totals are kept — never a member’s address.

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Opens in this browser with an invented site already in it. No account, no email address, nothing installed.

Lakeshore with its example records in it

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The problem

The amusement tax went online in 2025.

Since January 1, 2025, Chicago’s amusement tax takes 10.25% of charges for amusements delivered electronically, video streaming among them, reported on Form 7510. A subscription site with members billed in Chicago owes it on their charges. Working out which charges are Chicago’s, from a processor export, every month, is the part nobody does.

10.25%

of charges for amusements delivered electronically, such as video streaming.

City of Chicago →

Since 2025

January 1, 2025 is when the electronic rate took effect.

City of Chicago →

Form 7510

the return it is reported on.

City of Chicago →

Will not mark a month filed that rests on a guess.

Two decisions are asked for, never guessed: charges with no billing address, and charges in the two ZIP codes Chicago shares with its neighbours. Form 7510 filed refuses while the month is running, a decision is missing, the source is missing, the confirmation number is missing, or the amount paid is less than the tax. A filed month is never replaced.

How it works

Site, export, months

Set the site

The operator, the Chicago account, and the due day your registration gives.

Read the export

Choose the processor’s CSV. Lakeshore finds the columns, places each charge, and keeps only the month’s totals.

Work each month

Chicago charges, refunds, taxable amount, tax and shortfall. Make the two decisions, file, and write down the confirmation.

What it will never do

It reads the export. It keeps no member.

The export is read in your browser and thrown away. Only monthly totals are kept.

No addresses kept.Not one member’s billing address survives the read.

No processor link.You download the export; nothing connects to your processor.

It is not an accountant.Which members are Chicago’s is a setting you decide.

It never touches a payment.The subscription is for software.

Pricing

Priced per site

Less than a handful of Chicago members.

Most sites

One site

$19/month

One subscription site or clip store.

Processor export read in the browser
Monthly Form 7510 figures
Filing gate, no override

One site, yearly

$190/year

The same, two months free.

Everything in One site
Every month’s due date
Export for your bookkeeper

Subscription. Your bank statement says Lakeshore Software. Refunded in full on request within 30 days. Your licence key is emailed to you within two working days of payment.

Checkout is our own bitcoin server, not a card processor — nobody we had to apply to and nobody who can close the account. The button takes you straight to it. Give your email address there — that is where your key is sent.

Questions

The ones we actually get asked

How is a member placed in Chicago?

By billing address: a ZIP starting 606, or Chicago, Illinois. The city’s page does not say, so it is a setting.

What about members with no address?

You decide: count them as Chicago, or leave them out with the reason. Lakeshore will not guess.

Does it keep my export?

No. It reads the file in your browser, keeps the monthly totals, and clears the rest.

Is this tax advice?

No. It is the arithmetic your bookkeeper would otherwise do by hand.

What do I actually get when I pay?

The demo on this page is the whole program, running on invented records. Paying gets you a licence key — one line of text, emailed to the address you give at checkout within two working days. Paste it into the program and from then on it keeps your own records. Until then, nothing you type into it is kept.

The key is checked inside the page, on your own machine. It never calls us, so there is still no account and nothing about your business goes anywhere. If you ever stop paying, your records stay exactly where they are, read-only, and Export still hands you every one of them.

Open the demo before the next return

The invented site’s last month is past due, with charges that have no address, three in a shared ZIP, and annual renewals billed without the city tax. A small export is included to try the reader on.

Open the demo See pricing