TAX COURT PETITIONS MUST BE TIMELY-FILED EVEN THOUGH US TAX COURT BUILDING IS CLOSED
The US Tax Court building is closed. It is not accepting mail and it is not processing Tax Court petitions. Nevertheless, if you received a Notice of Deficiency, also known as a “90-day letter”, or tax attorney must still file the petition by mail. I know this sounds ridiculous because the petition must be filed within 90 days, get sent to the US Tax Court, and then will get returned. When the Tax Court reopens, the petition will need to be refiled with an affidavit attaching the returned postmark envelope showing that the petition was timely mail.
The logical thing would be to have an extension of time during the period that the Tax Court is closed. Unfortunately since filing a petition is jurisdictional, the Tax Court does not have this discretion.
I am sure there will be some interesting cases arising from these issues but it is a lot cheaper to simply mail in the Tax Court petition and have it returned.
If you have a question about this, email me or call me at 856-665-2121.
Ron Cappuccio
April 20, 2020
