As a CFO, controller or finance executive in a middle market company, you have a wide range of responsibilities to manage. State and local tax matters can pop up when you least expect it and cause compliance and financial burdens.
Some of those state tax surprises could be (regardless of industry):
- State tax registration requirements - when should you register? If you register, will that create tax filing obligations? When can you withdraw your registration?
- State income tax apportionment - when can your company allocate income instead of apportion income?
- Sales taxability of digital goods, licenses, subscriptions, computer hardware, software, cloud computing, etc.
- Sales tax audits and appeals
- Choosing sales tax codes for your sales and purchases to correctly utilize your sales tax compliance/decision software with your ERP system
- Knowing when your company has a filing obligation in a state
- Filing Voluntary Disclosure Agreements to mitigate prior year tax exposure
- Determining sales tax consequences of "bundled transactions" or "mixed transactions" (transactions that include taxable items with non-taxable items)
- Determining sales and use tax consequences for entities that conduct transactions with governmental entities. When does the exemption apply? What does the exemption apply to?
- If my company is a service provider, is my company paying use tax on purchases?
Several of my clients have had these issues recently. Do any of the above items sound familiar to you?