Tag

Avnet

Browsing

In a decision that may foretell the future of business privilege tax nexus, the Washington Supreme Court in November upheld the imposition of the state’s business & occupation (B&O) tax on an out-of-state distributor with respect to sales that were not generated by the distributor’s in-state office. In Avnet Inc. v. Dep’t of Rev., Dkt. No. 92080-0 (Wash. 2016), the Court effectively killed any notion that transactional nexus is required to impose the B&O tax—a tax on the privilege of doing business in Washington.  This case, coupled with the Ohio Supreme Court’s decision in Crutchfield v. Testa, which was decided one week before Avnet and involved Ohio’s similar Commercial Activity Tax (CAT), continue the trend of aggressively pursuing nexus in the business privilege tax context.