BEFORE THE UTAH STATE TAX
COMMISSION
__________________________
In Re: ) FINDINGS OF FACT,
: CONCLUSIONS
OF LAW,
XXXXX ) AND FINAL DECISION
:
: Appeal No.
91-0699
: Account
No. XXXXX
___________________________
STATEMENT OF CASE
This
matter came before the Utah State Tax Commission for a formal telephone hearing
on XXXXX. Joseph G. Linford, Presiding
Officer, heard the matter for and on behalf of the Commission. Present and representing the Petitioner was
XXXXX. Present and representing the
Collections Division of the Utah State Tax Commission was XXXXX.
Based
upon the evidence and testimony presented at the hearing, the Tax Commission
hereby makes its:
FINDINGS OF FACT
1. The tax in question is individual income
tax.
2. The periods in question are the tax years
XXXXX, XXXXX, XXXXX, and XXXXX.
3. Petitioner cites hardship and inability to
pay as the major basis for his request for waiver of the penalty and interest
assessed upon his individual income tax liability for the years in
question. The Petitioner no longer has
tax records for the XXXXX and XXXXX tax years and cannot fully recall why the
tax was late for those years. In XXXXX,
he thinks that his employer was perhaps withholding tax from Petitioner's wages
but was not remitting the tax. However, if this were the case, the employer
would be liable to the state for the non-remitted withholding tax and this
would have had no impact on Petitioner's for the years XXXXX, XXXXX, and XXXXX,
Petitioner thinks that he may have been working in different states during
those years and that this contributed to the untimeliness of the filing for
these years.
4. In XXXXX Petitioner was laid off from his
employment and then obtained new employment in early XXXXX. However, in XXXXX, after approximately three
months of work, Petitioner injured his back and has been disabled since that
time. Petitioner has been unable to
work and has been drawing worker's compensation. Petitioner cites this as the reason for his failure to timely
file and pay for the tax year XXXXX.
However, the Petitioner's injury does not have any direct relationship
to Petitioner's late filing for XXXXX.
Petitioner has given no reason why he could not have filed in time for
that year.
5. The tax, penalty, and interest assessments
in this case have occurred as a result of a Tax Commission audit. Petitioner has paid the tax amounts and now
requests that the penalty and interest be waived because of the above factors
and because of Petitioner's limited financial means, which render it, in
Petitioner's opinion, impossible for Petitioner to pay the penalty and interest
amounts.
CONCLUSIONS OF LAW
The
Tax Commission is granted the authority to waive, reduce, or compromise
penalties and interest upon a showing of reasonable cause. (Utah Code Ann. §59-1-401(8).)
DECISION AND ORDER
The
reasons that Petitioner has cited in support of his request for waiver are not
sufficient to warrant a waiver of the penalty and interest in this case. There is no indication as to why Petitioner
could not have filed and paid the taxes in a timely manner for each of the
years in question. The facts as they
now stand indicate that Petitioner has several years of delinquencies and no
substantial reason why those delinquencies occurred. In addition, interest should not be waived because the state was
deprived of the use of the tax funds in question for a period of time, through
no fault of its own, and should be compensated for that loss of use. Financial hardship alone also is not
sufficient reasonable cause under the law for waiver of penalty and interest.
Based
upon the foregoing, the Tax Commission finds that sufficient cause has not been
shown which would justify a waiver of the penalty and interest associated with
Petitioner's individual income tax for the tax years XXXXX, XXXXX, XXXXX, and
XXXXX. It is so ordered.
DATED
this 25th day of June, 1991.
BY ORDER OF THE UTAH STATE TAX COMMISSION.
R. H. Hansen Roger
O. Tew
Chairman Commissioner
ABSENT
Joe B.
Pacheco G.
Blaine Davis
Commissioner Commissioner