New Mexico State Tax Rulings
Free plain-English summaries of state tax letter rulings and advisory opinions issued in New Mexico, with full citations and the original source on every page.
No New Mexico rulings match these filters
Try a different search term or clear the filters.
If New Mexico wrongly told a business it owed gross receipts tax and it overpaid for years, can it get all of that money back — or does the three-year refund deadline bar the older years even though the state admits no tax was due?
The older years were barred, so the protest was DENIED. Raven Wolf Communications, a consulting astrologer serving only out-of-state clients by phone, was wrongly told by a Department counter employee…
Can a hospital take New Mexico's gross receipts tax deduction for selling tangible personal property to the government when it sells medical supplies and equipment to Medicare patients, given that the state already allows that deduction for Medicaid patients?
Yes — the hospitals won the core issue and the two 1995 assessments denying the deduction were abated in full. Two HCA hospitals sold medical supplies and equipment to Medicare patients and claimed th…
If a tax preparer never warned me about New Mexico gross receipts tax, am I excused from the penalty and interest for not paying it?
No — the protest was DENIED. Randall Summers, a race-track consultant, was paid $24,925 as an independent contractor by Pojoaque Tribal Enterprises to advise on the Downs of Santa Fe during the 1996 r…
If the state wrongly applies my income tax refund to someone else's tax bill, can I get it back years later or just stop paying my current taxes to make up for it?
No — the protest was DENIED. Satya Deb Misra was one of four partners in the Redwood Lodge motel partnership, which had registered for New Mexico's combined reporting system (CRS) taxes. He withdrew i…
If I lose the paperwork proving my sales commissions came from tax-free sales, can New Mexico still tax those commissions?
Yes — the protest was DENIED. Kimberly Ann Caylor worked in 1996 as an independent commissioned salesperson for a store selling antiques and fabrics. Commissions earned on nontaxable sales — out-of-st…
I overpaid gross receipts tax for years on income that was actually deductible. Can I get all of it refunded?
Only partly — the protest was DENIED. Bienvenidos Resort had paid gross receipts tax for years on its apartment-rental income, even though that income was deductible (and a landlord with three or fewe…
Can a contractor escape gross receipts tax by claiming he was an employee, or because a state employee supposedly told him his income was exempt?
No — the protest was denied. A maintenance contractor who worked for Burger King under a 1099, filed a Schedule C, and paid self-employment tax was an independent contractor, not an employee, so his r…
If I couldn't use a capital loss in the year I had it and want to carry it back to cut an earlier year's New Mexico tax, how long do I have to file the refund claim — and does an earlier amended return on a different issue keep that year open?
The protest was denied. Amoco carried a 1992 capital loss back to its 1989 New Mexico corporate income tax year to claim a $64,588 refund, but filed the amended 1989 return in January 1995 — more than…
Can I take a resale deduction from New Mexico gross receipts tax if I don't have the NTTCs, and how far back can the state assess if I understated the tax?
The protest was denied. Margaret's Upholstery was assessed gross receipts tax on 1988 magnet sales that the owner's late husband had handled as a distributor. The Department agreed to drop the out-of-…
I reported my pay as business income on my federal Schedule C, but I think I was really an employee — do I owe New Mexico gross receipts tax on it?
The protest was denied. Ruth Dilts worked as a live-in nurse-companion and, after 1982, was paid on a Form 1099 as 'nonemployee compensation' — about $100,849 in 1988. She reported that money as busin…
I overpaid a state fuel fee for years because the state's own form never told me to subtract the exempt gallons — can I still get all my money back?
The protest was denied. Smith Oil, a Clovis fuel distributor, paid New Mexico's petroleum products loading fee on all the diesel it received from 1990 to 1995 — including diesel sold for non-motor-veh…
Is renting out space to others a tax-exempt real-property lease, or a taxable license to use my property?
Mixed result: the rental receipts were taxable, but the penalty was abated. Quantum Corporation remodeled buildings into bingo halls and rented them to non-profit bingo operators for short 'sessions' …
When I bind books using my own labor and a customer's pages, am I selling goods to the government or performing a taxable service?
It's a taxable service. Bookbinders of New Mexico bound and rebound books — mostly for university and public libraries and other government agencies — using customer-supplied pages plus about $1.60 of…
I paid extra tax after an audit but before the Department issued any formal assessment notice — does my refund clock start from the audit or from the original due date?
From the audit — the producer won. BTA Oil Producers paid additional New Mexico oil and gas production taxes in October 1990 after a Department audit, remitting the underpayment shown in the Departmen…
The Department says I never paid, but I'm sure I mailed my return and a check — can I win with just my word?
No — uncorroborated testimony that you paid isn't enough to beat an assessment. Peter Grivas, a New Mexico resident, was assessed $2,158.27 in personal income tax plus interest and penalty for 1991 af…
Did CIBL's letters requesting a 2012 corporate income tax refund preserve the claim without a completed amended return before the December 31, 2016 deadline?
No. CIBL sent refund correspondence in 2013 and December 2016, but neither submission included the fully completed amended 2012 CIT-1 required by Regulation 3.1.9.8. The statute's list of refund-claim…
Could PerkinElmer retroactively replace its subsidiaries' separate 1999 New Mexico corporate income tax returns with a combined unitary return and claim a $740,529 refund?
No. Although the IRS audit made the late refund claim timely, PerkinElmer could not use a late-2007 amended return to retroactively change three subsidiaries' 1999 filing method from separate-entity r…
Browse New Mexico rulings by topic
These are official tax letter rulings and advisory opinions issued by New Mexico'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.