4 U.S.C. § 116 — Rules for determining State and local government treatment of charges related to mobile telecommunications services

submitted 26 years ago by Pub. L. 106-252 to r/title-4-FLAG-AND-SEAL-SEAT-OF-GOVERNMENT-AND-THE-STATES · 440 words · no verdicts yet

in plain englishAI-generated · not legal advice

This section and the next ten sections cover taxes on mobile phone service. It lists several kinds of taxes and fees the rules don't cover. It also excludes prepaid calling cards and certain radio services.

(a) Application of This Section Through Section 126 — This section, and sections 117 through 126 of this title, apply to any tax, charge, or fee that a taxing jurisdiction charges as a flat amount per customer, or based on the total amount billed to customers, for mobile telecommunications service. This applies no matter who legally owes the tax — the provider or the customer — and no matter what the tax is called. (b) General Exceptions — Sections 116 through 126 do not apply to: (1) any tax based on the provider's net income, capital stock, net worth, or property value; (2) any tax applied as an "equitably apportioned" flat amount, rather than calculated per transaction; (3) any tax that's really payment for a provider's use of public rights-of-way or public property — as long as it's not charged per customer or based on customer billing; (4) a state's generally applicable business-and-occupation tax on gross receipts, if it's legally owed by the "home service provider" and the state lets that provider use the sourcing method these sections require; (5) any fee tied to duties under section 254 of the Communications Act of 1934; or (6) any tax, charge, or fee imposed by the FCC. (c) Specific Exceptions — Sections 116 through 126 also: (1) don't decide where prepaid phone calling services are taxed; (2) don't affect whether the initial sale or resale of mobile telecom service is taxable — alone or bundled with other products — if the Internet Tax Freedom Act would already block a tax on it (this section doesn't say what Congress meant about that Act applying to those charges); and (3) don't decide where "air-ground radiotelephone service" (as defined in 47 C.F.R. § 22.99, as of June 1, 1999) is taxed.

the actual law source: uscode.house.gov ↗public domain

(a)Application of This Section Through Section 126.—

This section through 1 126 of this title apply to any tax, charge, or fee levied by a taxing jurisdiction as a fixed charge for each customer or measured by gross amounts charged to customers for mobile telecommunications services, regardless of whether such tax, charge, or fee is imposed on the vendor or customer of the service and regardless of the terminology used to describe the tax, charge, or fee.

(b)General Exceptions.—

This section through ¹ 126 of this title do not apply to—

(1)

any tax, charge, or fee levied upon or measured by the net income, capital stock, net worth, or property value of the provider of mobile telecommunications service;

(2)

any tax, charge, or fee that is applied to an equitably apportioned amount that is not determined on a transactional basis;

(3)

any tax, charge, or fee that represents compensation for a mobile telecommunications service provider’s use of public rights of way or other public property, provided that such tax, charge, or fee is not levied by the taxing jurisdiction as a fixed charge for each customer or measured by gross amounts charged to customers for mobile telecommunication services;

(4)

any generally applicable business and occupation tax that is imposed by a State, is applied to gross receipts or gross proceeds, is the legal liability of the home service provider, and that statutorily allows the home service provider to elect to use the sourcing method required in this section through ¹ 126 of this title;

(5)

any fee related to obligations under section 254 of the Communications Act of 1934; or

(6)

any tax, charge, or fee imposed by the Federal Communications Commission.

(c)Specific Exceptions.—

This section through ¹ 126 of this title—

(1)

do not apply to the determination of the taxing situs of prepaid telephone calling services;

(2)

do not affect the taxability of either the initial sale of mobile telecommunications services or subsequent resale of such services, whether as sales of such services alone or as a part of a bundled product, if the Internet Tax Freedom Act would preclude a taxing jurisdiction from subjecting the charges of the sale of such services to a tax, charge, or fee, but this section provides no evidence of the intent of Congress with respect to the applicability of the Internet Tax Freedom Act to such charges; and

(3)

do not apply to the determination of the taxing situs of air-ground radiotelephone service as defined in section 22.99 of title 47 of the Code of Federal Regulations as in effect on June 1, 1999.

Source credit: (Added Pub. L. 106–252, § 2(a), July 28, 2000, 114 Stat. 626.)

history & why it existsrecord from the source credit

2000Enacted · Pub. L. 106-252 · 114 Stat. 626

A history note hasn’t been published yet. The record shows enactment by Pub. L. 106-252 on 2000-07-28.

all 0 arguments · sorted by: best

no arguments yet — make the first case