Jeppesen sends a tax bill for last year purchase

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gkdave

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Dave
Hi all,
I was wondering if anyone else received a bill from Jeppesen recently for an undisclosed charge. For me, it was $32.
I called Jeppesen to find out why I was being charged. They said due to a new tax law, that is retro-active, that the charge was from my annual charts purchase in December 2013.

I cannot believe that this is even legal? I am no tax specialist, but how can you go back and ask a customer pay for taxes on a purchases made almost a year ago?

Has anyone else received a bill for a previous year purchase?
Frustrated.
 
gkdave said:
Hi all,
I was wondering if anyone else received a bill from Jeppesen recently for an undisclosed charge. For me, it was $32.
I called Jeppesen to find out why I was being charged. They said due to a new tax law, that is retro-active, that the charge was from my annual charts purchase in December 2013.

I cannot believe that this is even legal? I am no tax specialist, but how can you go back and ask a customer pay for taxes on a purchases made almost a year ago?

Has anyone else received a bill for a previous year purchase?
Frustrated.
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no, but the state of Georgia sends out paperwork every year to my office so I can claim anything that wasn't taxed. It's not like Jeppesen keeps it. If the state you lived in knew about the non-taxed purchase, they would come after you for it anyway.
 
You technically owe sales tax for every online purchase that doesn't add it in automatically. Nobody actually pays it but technically you're supposed to.
 
rbridges said:
It's not like Jeppesen keeps it.
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That remains to be seen. Do they have a tax license for that particular state? Do they have a tax license for that particular county? Are they registered with the Secretary of State? If not, they may not be able to legally collect the tax and/or submit it. The invoice I have from them indicates the tax is estimated which is total BS.
 
Clark1961 said:
That remains to be seen. Do they have a tax license for that particular state? Do they have a tax license for that particular county? Are they registered with the Secretary of State? If not, they may not be able to legally collect the tax and/or submit it. The invoice I have from them indicates the tax is estimated which is total BS.
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I'm willing to bet two dollars that Jeppesen, a subsidiary of Boeing, has sufficient legal talent, either in house, or in the parent company, or outside counsel to figure out sales tax collection and doing business in multiple states and countries. The recipient of the invoice has the option to ignore it, consult with his own counsel to determine whether it is legally collectible, or to just pay it. This is just my willingness to bet two dollars, not an assertion of fact, legal interpretation or financial advice. I will not take the same bet that Jeppesen has the marketing talent to tell their customers why they are getting this unexpected charge and to whom the money will go.

And just before I jump down from my soap box here, I do recommend that people learn the difference between sales taxes, use taxes, and personal property taxes.

Okay, I am stepping down now.

Scott
 
For Texas (and only for sure for Texas because just went through this for a $87k business purchase) -

- Seller is responsible for collecting Tax at the time of sale.
- If Seller does not collect and subsequently determines tax was due, Seller is responsible for tax payment to the State.
- Seller may then invoice tax amount due to Buyer, however this is a debt due Buyer to Seller and not to the State.

As this is state specific law, then YMMV.
 
Clark1961 said:
That remains to be seen. Do they have a tax license for that particular state? Do they have a tax license for that particular county? Are they registered with the Secretary of State? If not, they may not be able to legally collect the tax and/or submit it. The invoice I have from them indicates the tax is estimated which is total BS.
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But Jepp is required to collect taxes here in Colorado, since HQ is down the street.
 
l8evator said:
I'm willing to bet two dollars that Jeppesen, a subsidiary of Boeing, has sufficient legal talent, either in house, or in the parent company, or outside counsel to figure out sales tax collection and doing business in multiple states and countries. The recipient of the invoice has the option to ignore it, consult with his own counsel to determine whether it is legally collectible, or to just pay it. This is just my willingness to bet two dollars, not an assertion of fact, legal interpretation or financial advice. I will not take the same bet that Jeppesen has the marketing talent to tell their customers why they are getting this unexpected charge and to whom the money will go.

And just before I jump down from my soap box here, I do recommend that people learn the difference between sales taxes, use taxes, and personal property taxes.

Okay, I am stepping down now.

Scott
Click to expand...
The odds are that a number of states have started proceedings against large corporations to recover sales taxes with the current economy. It's why there's a growing movement against Amazon and other online vendors. Will be really interesting if Alibaba starts large scale consumer sales here.
 
Pretty sure they would have to spend a lot more than $32 to force you to pay it, and since they didn't do their job and collect it from you when you placed your order I'm not sure they can legally go after you for it now anyways. You agreed to a particular price for a particular product. They dont have the right to change that price after the deal is done. I'll talk to my Accountant about it tomorrow, but I'm about 99.9% sure her answer will be "throw that invoice in the trash, they cant prove you got it and they aren't gonna come after you over it either"
 
They can force it quite simply by denying further service until the bill is cleared.
 
Anecdote:

When we opened a gym in Pembroke Pines, FL, in July 1990 there was no sales tax on gym memberships. We sold a bunch.

Then FL made them taxable.

Retroactively. To the first of the year.

We had to send FL a big check. 6% of a pretty large number.

We sent a letter out to our members. The vast majority understood and paid the tax, reimbursing us. One or two protested heartily, and we let them slide.

What's fair and what's legal can be two very different things.
 
Not quite on point, but the idea is to double check.
I mail ordered some parts from a firm in a county in our state that has a local sales tax. Part of my county does and the part I live in does not. The firm charged the local sales tax, treating it as if I'd bought the item at their store. My state law says the tax is chargeable at the point of delivery and defined that in my case as my USPS mail address. They refunded the erroneously charged tax after I brought it to their attention. Took a couple of phone calls on follow up.
My point is simply that it might be worth double checking that the tax is legitimately due.
 
Henning said:
They can force it quite simply by denying further service until the bill is cleared.
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I suppose if it's an ongoing business relationship you are correct. If it were me and they tried that I'd be talking to customer service and telling them they need to waive their screwup. Most intelligent CS managers will realize that they will make more by keeping a continuing repeat customer than by forcing them to pay a small amount, then losing the ongoing business.
 
Wow,
thanks for all the replies gang.. I spoke with Jepessen and got an answer. Apparently when I purchased the Nav updates for my GTN-650, I was not charged a tax. I don't know whether I was supposed to be or not, but they sent me another bill later. I never received it. I moved from TX to NC during the time they changed some tax law.

Its not that much money, but the point was how can you try to collect tax for a purchase made many months earlier. It was their fault for not applying the tax, online or not.

Anyway, rant over and I have been happy with Jeppesen, although, I think the prices we pay for updates are outrageously overpriced. We as consumers don't have much of a choice.
Thanks for everyones thoughts and suggestions.
 
So did you end up paying them, or asking them to waive the charge since they were the ones that messed up?
 
StinkBug said:
I suppose if it's an ongoing business relationship you are correct. If it were me and they tried that I'd be talking to customer service and telling them they need to waive their screwup. Most intelligent CS managers will realize that they will make more by keeping a continuing repeat customer than by forcing them to pay a small amount, then losing the ongoing business.
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Those who call will likely be given a dispensation, I imagine they are counting on the honesty of most people to go ahead and pay the tax they owe.
 
Henning said:
Those who call will likely be given a dispensation, I imagine they are counting on the honesty of most people to go ahead and pay the tax they owe.
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When do you send your sales tax money in to the various state/county/city governments for the goods you purchase? You don't. if you were in the extreme minority of individuals who do, it would be called "use tax". Businesses pay sales tax, so they are who "owe" it. They're just allowed to show it to you on your receipt unlike most taxes that are hidden. OP doesn't owe this, Jeppesen does.
 
bartmc said:
When do you send your sales tax money in to the various state/county/city governments for the goods you purchase? You don't. if you were in the extreme minority of individuals who do, it would be called "use tax". Businesses pay sales tax, so they are who "owe" it. They're just allowed to show it to you on your receipt unlike most taxes that are hidden. OP doesn't owe this, Jeppesen does.
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If you want to modify the rules of the economy, I can accept that. However under our current social contract, the consumer pays for everything.
 
The consumer pays the seller, the seller pays the tax. As a business owner I'm quite familiar with this process. As a seller who also sells mail order from CA I am not required to collect tax on items sold and shipped out of state. If I were to forget to charge an in-state customer tax the Franchise Tax Board would still come after ME for that tax money, not the customer. I as the seller owe that tax, they dont care how much Joe Public paid me, only that I pay them.
 
StinkBug said:
The consumer pays the seller, the seller pays the tax. As a business owner I'm quite familiar with this process. As a seller who also sells mail order from CA I am not required to collect tax on items sold and shipped out of state. If I were to forget to charge an in-state customer tax the Franchise Tax Board would still come after ME for that tax money, not the customer. I as the seller owe that tax, they dont care how much Joe Public paid me, only that I pay them.
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Yep, that is how the legal standard works. In our culture we separate out most of the taxes and show the consumer what they pay for, and the consumer ends up paying it. In other cultures the taxes are all included in the advertised price. There is no western culture where the consumer does not expect the tax to be passed onto them. We place the legal responsibility to collect taxes on the merchants because it is easier to control and collect than if the govt has to bill every consumer direct. All not paying the tax does for the consumer is to assure a price increase on the product to make up for any shortfalls that may be experienced this quarter.
 
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