Text by Michael Chapin

One of my clients bought a very expensive instrument from a store. The store, acting as agent for a private owner, wanted her to provide an out-of-state address where they could say the instrument was shipped to when she actually took it home herself. This way the store wouldn’t collect New York sales tax.

Why? The original owner didn’t want any potential sale to include sales tax but instead wanted all the money a buyer could come up with for themselves – or they wouldn’t sell it.

My client came to me at tax time with this problem. We decided she should pay something called “use tax” in lieu of the sales tax the store wouldn’t collect. Read more: in Allegro (Archive: Volume 113 No. 2 February, 2013): http://www.local802afm.org/2013/02/buying-an-expensive-instrument-dont-try-to-avoid-sales-tax/.