Colorado State Tax Rulings
Free plain-English summaries of state tax letter rulings and advisory opinions issued in Colorado, with full citations and the original source on every page.
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After a sale is completed, can the retailer and buyer rescind it, claim a sales-tax refund, and resell the property to a leasing company that then leases it back to the buyer?
Only if there's a genuine full refund. Sales tax is a tax on a completed transaction, and later recasting the deal — rescinding it and reselling to a leasing company that leases the property back —…
For a commercial furniture dealer, which charges — delivery, installation, reconfiguration, repair, storage, freight-in, design — are subject to Colorado sales tax?
Services a furniture dealer provides are taxable when they're inseparable from the sale of the goods, and nontaxable when they're optional and separately stated. Resales to end users are taxable…
Is a service contract bought together with rented office equipment taxable in Colorado?
It depends on whether it's a separate contract. If the equipment rental and the service contract are one bundled deal, the entire consideration is taxable unless the retailer gets Department…
Are customized recruiting services and the resumes supplied to a client subject to Colorado sales tax?
No. The Department treated sourcing and recruiting for a particular client as nontaxable services. The resumes were incidental to that service. A reusable list sold to multiple clients could be…
Are outsourced call-center / contact-center services subject to Colorado sales tax?
No. Outsourced call-center / contact-center services aren't subject to Colorado sales tax. Colorado generally doesn't tax services, and although it does tax telephone service, the call-center…
Are CCTV consulting and project-management fees taxable in Colorado, and can a company credit sales tax it paid another state on equipment it bought to resell to its client?
Consulting and project-management fees for a video-surveillance system are not taxable if they're genuinely separable from the equipment sale and separately stated on the invoice (the Department…
When a night club collects all the money for a meal-and-show package sold with a separate restaurant, who reports and remits the sales tax?
It depends on the structure. If the night club is acting only as the restaurant's collecting agent, each business can report and remit sales tax on just its own portion of the package, even though…
For short-term rentals of oilfield living quarters, water/sewer systems, generators, transportation, cleaning, and consumables, who owes Colorado tax and on what?
For rentals of three years or less, the lessor is treated as the end user: it owes sales or use tax on what it paid for the equipment (with credit for tax paid another state), rather than charging…
Can a retailer buy bulk gift-card stock tax-free as a sale for resale, and is a transaction-tracking service bundled with the cards taxable?
No resale exemption. A gift card is functionally a credit voucher, not something the retailer actually sells to the customer (there's no separate charge for the card itself), so a retailer's bulk…
Are leases of dark (unlit) fiber-optic cable, and charges for 'lit' fiber, subject to Colorado sales or use tax?
It depends on the fiber. Leasing dark (unlit) fiber-optic cable is a taxable lease of tangible personal property if the cable keeps its identity as property and can be removed without significant…
Is crime-scene / biohazard property remediation (chemical wipe-downs, flooring removal, odor thermo-fogging) a taxable sale of property or a nontaxable service in Colorado?
It's a nontaxable service. Under Colorado's 'true object' test, crime-scene and biohazard remediation (chemical wipe-downs, removing flooring, thermo-fogging out odors) is primarily a service, not a…
Are energy drinks like Red Bull, and enhanced or carbonated waters, exempt 'food' or taxable in Colorado?
Energy drinks are taxable. Colorado exempts only 'food for domestic home consumption,' which it defines by what's eligible under the federal food-stamp (SNAP) and WIC programs. The USDA has…
When a leased vehicle is first leased and taxed in another state and then moved to Colorado, does Colorado give the lessee a credit for the tax paid to that other state?
Yes — but only if the other state's tax legally fell on the lessee. When a vehicle is first leased and taxed in another state, then moved to Colorado, the lessee owes Colorado use tax at…
Are the electronic messaging and production email services described in Colorado PLR-15-001 subject to sales or use tax?
No. The Department found the described messaging services outside taxable telephone and telegraph service. Even if production email were a taxable telegraph service, it concluded that the federal…
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These are official tax letter rulings and advisory opinions issued by Colorado's revenue authority in response to questions from specific taxpayers about how the tax law applies to their facts. A ruling is binding on the department only for the taxpayer who requested it and cannot be relied on by anyone else, but it is strong evidence of how the state reads the law. Every ruling above has a plain-English question and short answer, plus a link to the full original source.