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Show State May Issue Tokens for Sales Tax Payments The question of issuing sales tax tokens as used in other states for payment of fractional cent sales tax payments became a live matter in the state as a result of the supreme court decision this week on sales tax payments. There is no exemption from payment pay-ment of sales tax in Utah, regardless regard-less of the amount of the sale, was tne ruling of the supreme court Tuesday. In an opinion written by Justice D. W. Moffatt, and concurred in by the other four justices, the, court held that the retailer or person receiving re-ceiving the payment must return 2 per cent tax to the Utah state tax commission, even though the sale involved should be 10 cents. Although the court recognized that payment of a tax of, say, one-fifth one-fifth of a. cent, presented practical difficulties, it held that the problem prob-lem Is not insurmountable. "Tokens, stamps, debit or credit balances between vendor and vendee, ven-dee, over the short accounts, waiver of fractions by either party to the sale, mfcy overcome the practical difficulty; but certain it is that a tax is levied upon every sale within with-in the terms of the statute and the vendor is responsible tor the collection collec-tion of it," the ruling states. The tax commission is conducting an audit now with a view to finding find-ing whether tokens should come into use in the state, said Irwin Ar-novitz, Ar-novitz, chairman, following the ruling. rul-ing. All types of retail stores are being studied in an effort to find whether the purchaser is paying more than 2 per cent on aggregate purchases. Another study is going forward to discover practicality . of. . manufacturing manufac-turing the tokens at the state prison. pris-on. If such a system is adopted, stamped metal tokens of probably one-fifth of a cent value, will be made available to Utahns to pay tax on articles of less than 50 cents in price,, provided, of course, that the system is legal. The case axose out of thft failure of the W. F. Jensen Candy company of Logan to pay sales tax on a large portion of goods sold in July and August, 1935. In July, for instance, it claimed exemption on $1527.10 out of a total of $1818 because that amount represented anr accumulation accumula-tion of sales which were less than 50 cents. Again the tax was assessed .on the total amount of sales. The candy company applied for a hearing, but the commission still- maintained its position that 2 per cent of the total was due. On that record a writ of review was obtained from the supreme su-preme court, with the result that the decision of the tax commission was upheld Tuesday. The clause in the sales tax law, which provided the point of controversy, contro-versy, was: "The vendor may, if he sees fit, collect the tax from the vendee, but in no case shall he collect as tax an amount (without regard to fractional frac-tional parts of one cent) in excess of the tax computed at the rates prescribed by this act" o |