Sandbox & testing

Every Taxbit customer gets a sandbox tenant alongside their production tenant. The sandbox is where you build and test your integration against the real API, without filing anything, before you point the same code at production.

What a sandbox is

A sandbox is a second tenant of your organization, set up alongside your production tenant by your implementation manager.

• Same API. It answers on the same host as your production tenant, with the same endpoints and the same validation.
• Its own credentials and data. The sandbox has its own client_id and client_secret on the Developer Settings page in the Dashboard, and nothing you send to it reaches production. When one set of credentials covers more than one of your tenants, tenant_id in the token request picks the tenant; see Authenticate your tenant.
• Dashboard access. Your implementation manager adds your first users to each tenant, and after that you add users yourself. The Dashboard's organization switcher moves you between tenants.
• One environment per tenant. A sandbox tenant can't be split into dev and stage. To keep them apart, ask your implementation manager for a second sandbox tenant, or use ids that never overlap; see Prerequisites.

How a sandbox differs from production

• Nothing is filed. Nothing is filed with a tax authority from a sandbox tenant; filings come from your production tenant.
• No paper copies. No paper copies are mailed from a sandbox tenant.
• TIN matching is simulated. TIN matching in a sandbox tenant never reaches the IRS. Your implementation manager can explain how to produce each result.
• Sample forms on demand. You can generate a QA Package from the Eligibility page in the Dashboard: watermarked draft forms, plus the data behind them, so you can check your forms before tax season.

Test a full reporting cycle

Run these steps in the sandbox, in this order, for each product in your contract. Each links the page that does it.

1. Set up your filer. See Set up your filer. Account owners and accounts can't be created until the tenant has a default filer.
2. Configure your assets. The fiat and crypto assets your platform supports; see the Configure Assets reference.
3. Create account owners and accounts. See Create account owners and accounts.
4. Collect tax documentation. Render the React SDK in demo mode first, then submit real forms against the sandbox: Collect recipient tax data, Collect seller data, or Self-certification & transaction reporting.
5. Send transactions. See Send payment transactions or Set up inventory and gains.
6. Check inventory and gains, if they're in your contract. See Retrieve inventory and Retrieve gains.
7. Review sample forms. Generate a QA Package for each form type in your contract. Retrieve US tax forms shows how your app will fetch the real ones.
8. Test your webhooks, if you use them. Ask for a test subscription to a non-production endpoint, as in Webhooks.

Test data

• Use fictional data. Fictional names, addresses, and TINs cover every test, because TIN matching in a sandbox is simulated.
• Keep environments apart with a second sandbox tenant or ids that never overlap, as above.
• Cleaning up. Work with your implementation manager on the best approach to deleting account data, or to getting a new sandbox tenant if you need one.

Where to go next

When the cycle passes in the sandbox, see Post-Integration for the steps after your integration is built.

Questions? Contact your Taxbit implementation manager or [email protected].