New Rules in the United States Tax Court

The Tax Court has recently adopted amendments to its Rules of Practice and Procedure. See here.  These amendments come more than two years after the Tax Court proposed amendments to its rules to accommodate electronic filing of petitions and other documents. Pursuant to the new amendments to its rules, the Tax Court will soon allow electronic filing of Tax Court petitions and other documents.   (The Tax Court will provide detailed information regarding the implementation of electronic filing on its website once the Tax Court is ready for electronic filing.)   Under the new rules, if a Tax Court petition is filed electronically, an original signature is no longer required from the taxpayer or the taxpayer’s representative.

These changes will be helpful to many taxpayers. Currently, Tax Court petitions must be filed either in person or by mail to the Tax Court in Washington, D.C.   When a Tax Court petition arrives by mail, taxpayers often have to rely on the highly technical and esoteric “timely-mailing as timely-filing/paying” rules, which look to which postal carrier transmitted the document and which shipping speed was selected.  See here. Under the new Tax Court Rules, payments will also be able to be made electronically through Pay.gov.

Additional changes to the Tax Court Rules include: (1) changes to account for the Tax Court’s jurisdiction over passport certification cases; (2) a reference that the Tax Court will now follow the Federal Rules of Evidence (previously, the court followed the rules of evidence applicable in non-jury trials in the U.S. District Court of the District of Columbia); and (3) procedures for interest abatement cases.

For any questions on this please feel free to contact Jeffrey Glassman at jglassman@meadowscollier.com.