Tennessee Taxpayers Association

 It is our experience that fairness is not to be expected by Tennessee’s taxpayers. The only way to obtain such an unreasonable goal is to fight for it.            Jerry R. Caruthers, President

Not too long ago TTA finally convinced the Tennessee Legislature to permit tangible personal property taxpayers to file amended personal property assessment returns.   This right allowed the taxpayers to correct their errors, or request the Assessor to correct his or her errors, made in the original return. 

However, the State and local assessment officials strongly resisted, all the way to the bill’s final passage, to the taxpayers having this right.  On the other hand, with regard to just about any type tax return we can think of at any other governmental level, the taxpayers have long had the right, for a reasonable period of time (sometimes up to 3 years),  to file corrected or amended returns.  

Prior to passage of Amended Personal Property Return law the taxpayer’s only recourse was to catch errors early and file an appeal with local county board of equalization in June.   This allows the taxpayer about 3 months to file such an appeal.  

After the county board appeal rights have expired, if the taxpayer made a mistake in reporting the correct amounts of property, or if an unfavorable mathematical error was made by the taxpayer or the assessor, there was no way such errors could be corrected.  The taxpayer was just plain stuck with the erroneous taxes with no way to receive a refund of the overpaid amounts.

On top of all these injustices, a State administrative judge recently decided that only the original taxpayer or filer of the original return could file an amended return and, therefore, correct any errors made in the original return by the seller.

This meant that if a property was sold and the purchaser subsequently discovered errors in the return filed by the Seller, the State said no way can the purchaser file an amended return.   A purchaser, even though required to pay all or a portion of the the taxes, had no such rights as the original owners.

Justice Finally

After long appeals, the Tennessee Assessment Appeals Commission reversed the judge’s position and held that purchasers are successors in interest to the original owners and have the same rights to amend the original returns; a common sense ruling.  (Commission’s
Decision)

Thanks to this ruling, one more issue of fairness is again resolved in favor of the taxpayers, but not without fighting for it.

© copyright – Tennessee Taxpayers Association – September 30, 2009

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