sales tax – Duane Morris Appellate Review

The manner in which small businesses can easily solicit orders and sell merchandise over the internet may soon end. In its place, the Supreme Court may require a more regimented and costly scheme that may force many small businesses to go out of business or limit their sales to certain states. It all depends on the outcome of a recent case in the Supreme Court called South Dakota v. Wayfair, Inc. While Wayfair itself is not a small business, a decision in this case could adversely impact many small businesses that argue, like Wayfair, that they should have some presence in the state (and thus be a user of state services) before a state can impose a tax or tax collection duty on them. On the other hand, many larger businesses, local nonweb businesses and the states believe all businesses, whether in a state or not, should collect sales/use tax to even the playing field, and if some small businesses can’t hack it or handle the administrative or financial cost, so be it. This is the background on the issues at play in Wayfair.

Read the full Alert on the Duane Morris LLP website.

The Supreme Court of the United States has accepted for review the case of South Dakota v. Wayfair, Inc., et al, in which the state of South Dakota has challenged the continued viability of its 1992 Quill Corp. v. North Dakota decision that required some physical presence of a remote seller in a state before a state could impose its sales tax collection obligations on the seller. The Supreme Court in 1992 held it was up to Congress to change the test. In this new case, the South Dakota Supreme Court held that South Dakota’s attempt to legislatively override Quill was in violation of the law. By hearing the case, the U.S. Supreme Court will now decide whether to change the law or continue to allow the physical presence standard to stand, until and unless the Congress decides to change it. This decision could have far-reaching effects on interstate commerce, especially impacting internet sellers.

To read the full text of this Alert, please visit the Duane Morris website.