Connecticut DRS Moves to Collect Back-Taxes on Newegg Customers

[TheOne&OnlyZeke]

What y'all need to do is setup an account, give me access, i'll use my irish CC to buy the stuff and ship to a local PO box
I'll change a nominal 5% and ye can get loads of shit and not worried about being caught

 

[c3k]

Connecticut is broke. Flat, totally, sell-the-kids broke.

I lived there. I moved. Because the taxes were skyrocketing and there was still no fiscal discipline.

CT was famous for just having property taxes, based on your town. Then, there was a fiscal emergency. Yeah. So the governor and legislature instituted an income tax. Hey, it was a TEMPORARY INCOME TAX. You know, until the emergency was over.

That was in ~1980.

Connecticut will continue to grasp at anyone's money they can grab. It's easier to take money than it is to ratchet back entitlements or pay down debts. It's fun living on credit, isn't it?

"Socialism is fine, until you run out of other people's money."

If you live in Connecticut, and you can, you need to move. It will only get worse. Much worse.

 

[thebufenator]

"Socialism is fine, until you run out of other people's money."

So much this

 

[steakman1971]

I'm hoping Newegg only gave the info over based on a legal order (which they hopefully disputed). Otherwise, this is shit. It's no state's business to know what I purchased.
I used to spend several thousands of dollars every year at NewEgg. They were great. I gradually drifted to either Microcenter or Amazon (and also don't spend as much - married with children now...) . I found Neweggs prices to have gotten higher, their shipping sucks compared to Amazon, and no one can beat Microcenter - I drive their and pick up when I want something. (Plus, Microcenter has killer combo prices - I'll be sure to check them out when I build my next PC.)

 

[Deleted member 93354]

It's all a liberal democrat money grab to support illegals and welfare. MA has done something similar with PayPal.

Just what we need, another parrot. Please can we leave half brain politics out of it?

 

[Deleted member 93354]

You just better hope that they don't go crazy looking back through years of receipts.

It varies state to state. But in PA it's 5 year limit. At the Federal level it's 7 years.

Can't say I didn't warn you guys.

 

[focbde]

10% tax would be nice. Retailers that don't charge tax would be nice.

I pay 13% and quite a few provinces are still at 15%. I've never NOT paid taxes in my province. Even on sites that will list the checkout price with the item and shipping as $xyz, as soon as you click next, BOOM, sales tax added lol.

I've even had purchases on eBay list taxes after clicking pay now.

Us here in Europe think all of this is pretty amusing, given our massive tax rates...

 

[Burticus]

Us here in Europe think all of this is pretty amusing, given our massive tax rates...

Sure but doesn't the EU have "free" healthcare and retirement for all?

 

[ir0nw0lf]

Very rarely is Newegg cheaper than Amazon.

I'll say quite the opposite, very rarely is Amazon cheaper than Newegg. [for most of the stuff I order, not factoring in shipping/tax in FL on Amazon orders]

 

[Deleted member 93354]

Us here in Europe think all of this is pretty amusing, given our massive tax rates...

Well "you in Europe" have greater social programs and don't tax your businesses as heavily as us here. (Statistically speaking)

 

[Deleted member 93354]

I'll say quite the opposite, very rarely is Amazon cheaper than Newegg. [for most of the stuff I order, not factoring in shipping/tax in FL on Amazon orders]

It's a wash to be honest. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. If you have prime, the free shipping cost usually offsets the tax charged (compared to newegg).

 

[nutzo]

I'm not disagreeing there is a lot of waste. But taxes go into one big pool. You just aren't paying for roads.
You're paying for a state legal system to protect you. There's also state social services, parks, education, disaster support, inspectors, environment etc...
And internet orders put brick and mortars under water. That's lost jobs. Raising the prices on goods through tax offsets that a tiny bit.
But I seriously doubt any of you looked at your state budget and where the funds come from and go to.

You forgot to include the 6 figure government pensions, the not so high speed train to nowhere (out here in California), funding for the "undocumented", handouts and massive tax breaks to well connected billionaires, subsidies to rich people to buy Tesla's so they can drive in the carpool lane, etc.

 

[hey_pig]

I was bit in ass by this too!!


I am a long time newegg customer, with easily $9k+ purchases a year thru their web site, I made the huge mistake of using a single account to purchase multiple PC's for others and clients. So I receive and email stating the total of all my purchases which puts me on the hook for over $400 of use taxes from PC's and parts that I do not use and will never use.

The kicker: they report this number BEFORE anyone can correct these numbers that are obviously not correct.

2 hours on newegg customer service results in the rep refusing to help, even when I have all the documentation from all the clients/customers to back my claims. Just strait up refused and told to contact the state of colorado, 3 more hours on the phone with colorado dept of rev. results in them telling me to get newegg to correct its numbers and resubmit.

I will never use this web site again, fuckign shame


TLDR: DO NOT USE YOUR NEWEGG ACCOUNT TO PURCHASE FOR OTHERS. (COLORADO)

 

[Nobu]

I was bit in ass by this too!!


I am a long time newegg customer, with easily $9k+ purchases a year thru their web site, I made the huge mistake of using a single account to purchase multiple PC's for others and clients. So I receive and email stating the total of all my purchases which puts me on the hook for over $400 of use taxes from PC's and parts that I do not use and will never use.

The kicker: they report this number BEFORE anyone can correct these numbers that are obviously not correct.

2 hours on newegg customer service results in the rep refusing to help, even when I have all the documentation from all the clients/customers to back my claims. Just strait up refused and told to contact the state of colorado, 3 more hours on the phone with colorado dept of rev. results in them telling me to get newegg to correct its numbers and resubmit.

I will never use this web site again, fuckign shame


TLDR: DO NOT USE YOUR NEWEGG ACCOUNT TO PURCHASE FOR OTHERS. (COLORADO)

Only time I buy things for others is when I have a store card with x% off/cash back, then I ask for whatever I'm out back, minus any savings (unless I'm feeling generous). If taxes aren't included, I pay them myself...but then I'm not buying thousands untaxed online, so I usually am owed some money from the tax police.

 

[Master_shake_]

10% tax would be nice. Retailers that don't charge tax would be nice.

I pay 13% and quite a few provinces are still at 15%. I've never NOT paid taxes in my province. Even on sites that will list the checkout price with the item and shipping as $xyz, as soon as you click next, BOOM, sales tax added lol.

I've even had purchases on eBay list taxes after clicking pay now.

There's was a time you only paid 5 percent for out of province transactions.

Thank goodness they fixed that.

Or else we'd have no roads or some other bullshit excuse.

 

[Toepunch]

Newegg.com is a fabulous search tool for Amazon.com.

Exactly what I do

 

[Nytegard]

Connecticut is broke. Flat, totally, sell-the-kids broke.

I lived there. I moved. Because the taxes were skyrocketing and there was still no fiscal discipline.

CT was famous for just having property taxes, based on your town. Then, there was a fiscal emergency. Yeah. So the governor and legislature instituted an income tax. Hey, it was a TEMPORARY INCOME TAX. You know, until the emergency was over.

That was in ~1980.

Connecticut will continue to grasp at anyone's money they can grab. It's easier to take money than it is to ratchet back entitlements or pay down debts. It's fun living on credit, isn't it?

"Socialism is fine, until you run out of other people's money."

If you live in Connecticut, and you can, you need to move. It will only get worse. Much worse.

One of the major problems is our pension fund. There are over 1000 people making 6 figures in their pension, with quite a few making over $200k. (In 2010, slightly only more than 100 people made 6 figures). And they're guaranteed cost of living increases as well as inflation increases. Plus, they're also guaranteed fully paid health care. Right now, the retired state employees cost more than every active state employee. This makes up 1/3 of our entire budget, and it's vastly underfunded. This sounded great while the baby boomers were still in the workforce, where few in our government had the foresight to see that this could be a problem.

 

[bman212121]

So the one loophole I see in this right away is that if you reported any use tax at all on your tax documents, you never had to identify where it came from. So if you reported use tax for say purchases at Frys, it would seem like you could have shown enough use tax to cover Newegg purchases, and they wouldn't be able to go after you because it looks like you paid enough to cover what was reported to them.

 

[focbde]

Well "you in Europe" have greater social programs and don't tax your businesses as heavily as us here. (Statistically speaking)

The combined corporate tax rate in Germany is 30-33%. The effective corporate tax rate in the USA has been lower than in Europe for some time.

We do have better social programs, that's true, but then income tax here is much, much higher as well. The majority of my income is taxed at 42%.

 

[focbde]

Sure but doesn't the EU have "free" healthcare and retirement for all?

It's not free. I pay about 680 Euro per month for compulsory health insurance, and 600 Euro for compulsory pension contribution.

This on top of a lot of my income being taxed at 42% (sliding scale). Looking at my last payslip, as I am not married, which would change things, I get about 56% of my Gross salary in the hand.

My children are covered under the 680 Euro for health insurance as well, however. That's how the system works. The earner pays - those without kids are essentially subsidising those who do have kids.

 

[dbwillis]

Ill keep an eye in the mail for something from the DRS.

**I also kept a bunch of receipts for stuff the DRS owes me..
Like buying a car battery, paying for the battery, core charge, tax, then bringing the old battery back and only getting $5, wheres my Fin 6.35% tax I paid on it?

 

[otherweeb]

You guys understand these taxes aren't just going to your state, they drill down to your community. So if you don't mind cutting back on the police or firemen or schools, pleez feel free to evade your local taxes.

Liberal states want more welfare, let them reap what they sow.

Florida has no income tax, by the way. Sales tax is nominal, with no BS internet self-reporting. Although Amazon has locations here, so stuff from Amazon is usually taxed.

Ha, Blue states pay Federal taxes, Red states spend it.

 

[oldmanbal]

If newegg doesn't have any physical warehouse/store/offices in CT... why should they pay a fine? Or even further why should newegg give a shit and cooperate? This is literally nothing but the state of CT being so desperate for money they are snooping around into another states business looking for dirt on it's own residents.

If you are a resident of that state the law says you have to self report the taxes... that falls on you. newegg shouldn't have to do YOUR job for you. Upon a little further research, it seems newegg has zero presence in CT, and handed over their records voluntarily so the state could carry out it's little hunt. From a business perspective, newegg just shot itself in the foot both by turning over it's records when it didn't need to.

Just like everything else in the world - the motivator is money. The state wants it's cut despite doing nothing, contributing nothing, and producing nothing. Imagine you owned a business on the other side of the country and a state you have zero dealings with wants to fine you because it's residents aren't doing what they are supposed to do? Sound fair?

I agree that Newegg didn't exactly appear to make any resistance to CTs demands. While we may not know all the communications behind the scenes, this is a loss for the consumer regardless.

 

[Biznatch]

Move or try to get the tax policies changed; but please stop whining about how over taxed you are.

Oh noz, I made a comment against something, that can be nothing other than whining right??? How about you stop your 'whining' about my post and contribute something to the thread, not making useless suggestions on something you know nothing about....... "Sure let me just got change my state tax laws, it's so easy why didn't i think of that. If not i'll just move, I can't possibly have any reasons that would make that impossible....."

 

[zkostik]

New egg is probably going down in flames for any buyers in CT
Unless New Egg has a location in CT I'm not sure why they are turning over any information at all.

That's what I thought, is this even legal for CT (or any other state) to demand tax even though Newegg has no physical presence there? Etsy does this for Washington state now despite not being present there...

 

[otherweeb]

It sure as shit does, especially if it's not a court order. Who the fuck is some state official demanding the accounts and data from a company in a different state?
And a demand to create a presence in the state is straight up strong arming. You can't do either.

I get the feeling you have never been involved in business to business transactions. This is routine on that level. Transactions are recorded, vendors Fed tax ID codes are documented, and all this is reviewable by your local state auditors.

"Who the fuck is some state official demanding the accounts and data from a company in a different state?" A Connecticut official is asking about a transaction in Connecticut. That's his job. Resolve tax issues in HIS state.

Presence in the state? I can't find that reference, but it may be referring to Tax 'Nexus' https://quickbooks.intuit.com/r/taxes/what-is-nexus-and-how-does-it-affect-your-small-business/ which is an implied presence from frequent sales transactions.

 

[tazeat]

lol @ individual persons voluntarily paying use taxes that you have not been billed for. I'd like to see that. Just be glad 6.5% is still pretty cheap compared to some lovely parts of this country :|

 

[otherweeb]

In my opinion Newegg brought this on themselves. They could have hired a few accounting serfs to apply sales tax as appropriate, but they made a business bet that the Internet would be tax free forever because bill's like this: https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/113/s743 keep failing and states would not have the balls to ask.

 

[ArFLaserBear]

lol @ individual persons voluntarily paying use taxes that you have not been billed for. I'd like to see that. Just be glad 6.5% is still pretty cheap compared to some lovely parts of this country :|

On my tax forms I get taxed a tad under 30% (income tax) add to that required pension of about 7% and the almost flat 25% tax on everything you buy, if you add everything together then yea you get taxed 40-60% (depending on income) I would show you my tax forms but it would take to long to redact personal info and the sums are also laughable low and I don't wanna get bullied... Oh and I don't pay all that much on stuff like property/car/savings tax cause I don't own any...

 

[otherweeb]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newegg

Revenue

US$2.65 billion (2016)[1][2] If spread evenly that's $53 million per state. That's why states are pressuring them

 

[triwolf]

Author of the IRS Medic article mentioned in OP here. Not a court order, but Connecticut did apparently send out demand letters to online retailers last year, giving them the option to either register as a vendor in Connecticut (and thus subject themselves to the obligation to collect sales tax and remit to CT), or turn over customer data. What the recourse was if they didn't comply? I'm not sure. It would appear that Newegg is the only company that acquiesced. Interestingly, as Dead Parrot above mentions, the SCOTUS is scheduled to review a South Dakota law passed in 2017 that directly contradicted Quill by requiring out of state retailers with no physical presence to collect sales tax and remit to SD. Three online retailers challenged the law: Wayfair, Overstock, and... Newegg. I'm not sure what the motivation was behind turning over the customer data to CT, but one has to assume it's related to South Dakota v. Wayfair, Inc. It's looking like the SCOTUS will overturn Quill and all online retailers will be required to collect sales tax on all sales, regardless of physical presence. I just don't really understand Newegg shooting themselves in the foot like this in anticipation of the rule change. 3D chess from their legal team or something, idk.

This is so time consuming for businesses it's lunacy. This is the same sort of stuff like the time the IRS broke down a businesses door and arrested a guy over a $0.10 tax that was not paid! Who are these morons? Do they not see that forcing businesses to collect for 50 states and provinces it will utterly destroy the business? How do I pay state taxes when as the business owner I don't even live there? Complete insanity. So they now are going to bust Joe Everyday for not taking five weeks of his year to add up all the things they bought all year? Do they think we don't sleep or have anything else that is a priority over this? The Government has totally gone coo coo.

 

[triwolf]

Newegg sent me a summary of my purchases this and last year for tax purposes (as required by the state of Louisiana, apparently). Made reporting those purchases easy, at least.

Amazon collects in LA, so that's no problem. I don't bother reporting the items from third-party sellers...don't tell anybody.

I'll refrain from discussing the ethical points...

See this is the problem. It wastes everyone's time and no one can even do it right if they wanted to! The rules keep changing, it would take you all year to figure it out, you'd literally get nothing else done! This world need some logic and help! What a joke! Then when you try to explain it to a "Powers that be", all they say is well everyone is expected to do it! It's just like corporation policies, they are so stupid and no one challenges them just get in line like a good little sheeple!

 

[Deleted member 93354]

The combined corporate tax rate in Germany is 30-33%. The effective corporate tax rate in the USA has been lower than in Europe for some time.

We do have better social programs, that's true, but then income tax here is much, much higher as well. The majority of my income is taxed at 42%.

Our tax rates for corporations are
21% -> 33% based on state
plus another 1.45% for social security for every employee $.

Germany sits at 29.65%

So it's a toss up really depending on state.

Personal tax is up to another 67% of earned income

Sales tax can take away another 11.725% in some states.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_tax_rates

It's becoming a lopsided system no matter which country you are from. (I'm looking at you Greece) Here in the states 1 out of every 3 jobs is dependent on some type of government spending. That's just begging for system collapse.

 

[triwolf]

I get the feeling you have never been involved in business to business transactions. This is routine on that level. Transactions are recorded, vendors Fed tax ID codes are documented, and all this is reviewable by your local state auditors.

"Who the fuck is some state official demanding the accounts and data from a company in a different state?" A Connecticut official is asking about a transaction in Connecticut. That's his job. Resolve tax issues in HIS state.

Presence in the state? I can't find that reference, but it may be referring to Tax 'Nexus' https://quickbooks.intuit.com/r/taxes/what-is-nexus-and-how-does-it-affect-your-small-business/ which is an implied presence from frequent sales transactions.

Can I ride a unicorn when I'm in the Tax Nexus? We are into super insane at this point.

Taxes should never be more than 10% total, any more is just going to be wasted. See the American Revolution for more information.

Too bad most people are sheeple.

 

[tazeat]

On my tax forms I get taxed a tad under 30% (income tax) add to that required pension of about 7% and the almost flat 25% tax on everything you buy, if you add everything together then yea you get taxed 40-60% (depending on income) I would show you my tax forms but it would take to long to redact personal info and the sums are also laughable low and I don't wanna get bullied... Oh and I don't pay all that much on stuff like property/car/savings tax cause I don't own any...

I've never filed a state tax form, so there is that at least. But with over 10% sales tax now, I do go out of my way to buy larger purchases from places like Newegg vs Amazon or brick and mortar stores. I don't personally know of anyone that's voluntarily paid use tax on those items.

 

[triwolf]

See this is the problem. It wastes everyone's time and no one can even do it right if they wanted to! The rules keep changing, it would take you all year to figure it out, you'd literally get nothing else done! This world need some logic and help! What a joke! Then when you try to explain it to a "Powers that be", all they say is well everyone is expected to do it! It's just like corporation policies, they are so stupid and no one challenges them just get in line like a good little sheeple!

This whole debate makes my blood boil. The state of Government and the World in general is so bad I can see why many people just don't give two shits anymore. No sane person can stand this stuff anymore. Seems like the blind leading the blind down the idiot hole.

At what point does the whole system lock up like in the 2008 crash of the stock market and money markets? Too many people with no business being in charge, being in charge.

 

[tungt88]

Connecticut is broke. Flat, totally, sell-the-kids broke.

I lived there. I moved. Because the taxes were skyrocketing and there was still no fiscal discipline.

CT was famous for just having property taxes, based on your town. Then, there was a fiscal emergency. Yeah. So the governor and legislature instituted an income tax. Hey, it was a TEMPORARY INCOME TAX. You know, until the emergency was over.

That was in ~1980.

Connecticut will continue to grasp at anyone's money they can grab. It's easier to take money than it is to ratchet back entitlements or pay down debts. It's fun living on credit, isn't it?

"Socialism is fine, until you run out of other people's money."

If you live in Connecticut, and you can, you need to move. It will only get worse. Much worse.

Do you happen to know a website/link as to why Connecticut is dealing with such financial issues? I'm genuinely curious, as there are a number of wealthy towns in Conn, and I'm surprised that they are running out of cash.

 

[c3k]

Do you happen to know a website/link as to why Connecticut is dealing with such financial issues? I'm genuinely curious, as there are a number of wealthy towns in Conn, and I'm surprised that they are running out of cash.

My wife used to hit the websites and had all the info. Sorry, no links. But the gist is, as mentioned upstream, pensions. Towns usually have volunteer fire departments (in my experience/recollection). The costs come from school systems and police departments. My town was on the shore. Our police had SWAT gear, assault boats, you name it. Their salary maxed out at ~100k on paper. But with overtime (gotta have a "trained traffic officer" guarding the traffic cone if the cable company tosses a cherry picker up a pole), etc., it was rare that they'd pull in less than ~$150k. Then, they'd retire after 20 years with a 75% pension, based on the average of the highest 36 months. Or something like that. The pension would equal or exceed the "max" pay. Age 40 or so. Then they'd get a second job. Campus cop on one of the many colleges. (Free tuition for all family members.) Teachers have similar perqs. 80 year life span, 20 years of work, 40 years of 3/4 pension? Not sustainable without a booming population.

Entitlements, pensions, infrastructure costs are all increasing and add a shrinking tax base to it. The politicians' solution was to increase the tax rate. That led to flight. If you can afford to leave, you're probably in the higher tax levels. The loss of the higher tax revenue means they want to accelerate the tax rate increases. The obvious solution is to lower the tax rate, and lower pensions and entitlements. (This doesn't touch the increased cost of borrowing due to a lowered bond rating.)

Pensions for public workers are the big one.

 

[panhead]

Oh noz, I made a comment against something, that can be nothing other than whining right???

It is whining, Tax rates in the US are at historic lows. (and deficits are reaching historic highs).

 

[earnolmartin]

I was bit in ass by this too!!


I am a long time newegg customer, with easily $9k+ purchases a year thru their web site, I made the huge mistake of using a single account to purchase multiple PC's for others and clients. So I receive and email stating the total of all my purchases which puts me on the hook for over $400 of use taxes from PC's and parts that I do not use and will never use.

The kicker: they report this number BEFORE anyone can correct these numbers that are obviously not correct.

2 hours on newegg customer service results in the rep refusing to help, even when I have all the documentation from all the clients/customers to back my claims. Just strait up refused and told to contact the state of colorado, 3 more hours on the phone with colorado dept of rev. results in them telling me to get newegg to correct its numbers and resubmit.

I will never use this web site again, fuckign shame


TLDR: DO NOT USE YOUR NEWEGG ACCOUNT TO PURCHASE FOR OTHERS. (COLORADO)

Yes, Colorado is very aggressive on this too. If they're going to start playing this game, I'm going to quit buying in general. Screw the economy, and thanks for killing it for us. We now live in a country where it's not worth creating a business, not worth innovating, and not even worth buying anything because more and more of our money gets stolen for nothing. Well, guess I'll just quit playing then. Good luck!