By Hanish Patel and Eric Coffill
The Supreme Court of Virginia held that a city could not impose its consumer utility tax on the natural gas consumed by an electric power company solely for the purpose of generating electricity. Virginia localities are authorized to impose the tax on consumers of natural gas provided by a
Sutherland SALT tracks and tallies significant state and local tax litigation wins and losses in the quarterly Sutherland SALT Scoreboard publication. In this videocast, Charles C. Capouet and Elizabeth S. Cha share the second quarter highlights from the SALT Scoreboard, including the shift in momentum for state revenue departments and recent results regarding states’ manufacturing
By Chris Mehrmann and Carley Roberts
An administrative law judge (ALJ) of the Arkansas Department of Finance and Administration upheld the denial of a taxpayer’s corporate income tax refund claim, after the taxpayer attempted to amend its returns to apply the cost of performance method of sourcing income. Arkansas has adopted section 18 of the
By Charles Capouet and Jonathan Feldman
The Wisconsin Court of Appeals held that Wisconsin courts lacked personal jurisdiction over the Mississippi Department of Revenue so as to subject it to a lawsuit in the state. An individual taxpayer asserted that the Mississippi DOR had filed a fraudulent tax lien against him. The taxpayer moved from
By Ted Friedman and Madison Barnett
The North Carolina Court of Appeals held that it would violate Due Process to impose income tax on an out-of-state inter vivos trust because the trust lacked a sufficient connection with North Carolina. The trust was created and governed by laws outside of North Carolina, the Trustee resided outside
Sutherland SALT releases the second edition of the SALT Scoreboard, a quarterly publication that tracks significant state tax litigation and controversy developments and tallies the results of taxpayer wins and losses across the country. Our quarterly publication features Sutherland’s observations regarding important state tax decisions and will identify trends by issue, state and forum as
By Alla Raykin and Jonathan Feldman
An administrative law judge (ALJ) held that a taxpayer’s activities in Washington were not selling, soliciting or negotiating insurance in the state, but rather marketing other in-state insurance companies’ products and receiving commissions from those marketing materials. Accordingly, the taxpayer was not eligible for the lower business & occupation
By Zachary Atkins and Charlie Kearns
The Massachusetts Appeals Court upheld an Appellate Tax Board decision disallowing interest expense on certain intercompany financing transactions because the underlying agreements did not establish an “unqualified obligation to repay.” The taxpayers, subsidiaries of a British utility, entered into a series of complex agreements—deferred subscription agreements—to sell and repurchase
By Hanish Patel and Amy Nogid
The Minnesota Supreme Court held that Minnesota’s adoption of the Multistate Tax Compact (Compact) did not create a binding contractual obligation and, as a result, the state’s subsequent repeal of the Compact’s alternative apportionment election provision was not prohibited as unconstitutionally impairing contractual obligations. As such, the taxpayer was
By Hanish Patel and Eric Coffill
The Alabama Tax Tribunal held that a taxpayer was entitled to a refund of sales taxes paid on purchases of software that was modified for its exclusive use because it constituted nontaxable custom software. Relying on its regulation, the Alabama Department of Revenue (DOR) denied the refund, stating the
