On September 4, 2020, in New Cingular Wireless PCS LLC v. Commissioner of Revenue, No. 18-P-1317, the Massachusetts Appeals Court held that the Internet Tax Freedom Act (ITFA) preempted Massachusetts’ sales tax on New Cingular Wireless’ (NCW) Internet access charges. The court concluded that NCW satisfied ITFA’s requirement that it offer screening software to its customers, even though: (1) NCW’s salespersons did not affirmatively ask each customer whether it wanted to purchase the software; and (2) the software was not compatible with every device sold by NCW.
Eversheds Sutherland filed an amicus curiae brief in support of NCW on behalf of the Broadband Tax Institute.
Read the full Legal Alert here.
In this article published by Bloomberg Tax, Eversheds Sutherland Partners Eric Tresh and Todd Lard and Associate Charles Capouet expand on this alert.