Will the slump in the real estate market give companies a bit of a break on their property tax bills this year? Most tax execs don’t think so, according to a May survey from The Tax and Accounting business of Thomson Reuters. Fifty-eight percent of the execs polled think that their property tax will either stay the same or increase over 2009’s. more

The surreally titled American Jobs and Closing Tax Loopholes Act — which should be renamed the “Tax Code Complexification and To Keep a Bunch of Tax Breaks Act” — comes up for a test vote in the Senate tomorrow. Businesses will want to keep an eye on the corporate tax extenders and revenue raisers. more

In my last post, I covered some details of Pennsylvania’s tax amnesty and the seriously creepy video that the state’s department of revenue put out to publicize it. That got me thinking what other state amnesty opportunities might be on offer around the nation.

Turns out there are quite a few. more

This year’s George Orwell Prize for Most Intimidating Tax Propaganda goes to the Pennsylvania Department of Revenue for this effort publicizing a tax amnesty that waives all penalties and half of accrued interest on delinquent payments. The initiative has pulled in close to $51 million in back taxes, according to a DOR announcement. The largest payment to date was $1.2 million for unspecified corporate taxes. Better hurry up and get your paperwork in, all you deadbeat Pennsylvania firms; the amnesty ends June 18. And remember: They Know Who You Are. ###

Keeping track of customer exemption certificates should be an integral part of sales and use tax management, but it often gets shoved aside until businesses finally get dinged by a state audit assessment. Companies are forever losing their certificates, which seems pretty astounding until you realize that they can run into the thousands — or even tens of thousands — for a large organization. There comes a point where stuffing them into a filing cabinet somewhere doesn’t work anymore. more