Court’s inaccessibility extends taxpayers’ petition filing deadline

The Tax Court’s inaccessibility by closure tolled a taxpayer couple’s filing deadline by the period of inaccessibility plus 14 days, the Tax Court held in applying Sec.  7451(b) for the first time.

Facts: The IRS issued Madiodio Sall and Ramatoulaye Fall a notice of deficiency dated Aug. 25, 2022, for their 2017 and 2018 individual income tax returns.  The notice was sent by certified mail to the taxpayers on Aug. 26, 2022.  The deficiency notice stated that Nov. 25, 2022, was the last day to file a petition with the Tax Court challenging the notice. The court was administratively closed that day, although its electronic filing system was accessible and operating.

Sall mailed a petition to the Tax Court on Nov. 28, 2022, which the court received and filed on Dec. 1, 2022.  The IRS filed a motion to dismiss the petition, claiming that the court lacked jurisdiction to hear the case, since the deadline for filing the petition had passed when Sall mailed it and therefore it was untimely.

Issues: Since the Tax Court is a court of limited jurisdiction, it may exercise jurisdiction only as “expressly provided by statute” (Naftel, 85 T.C. 527 (1985); Breman, 66 T.C. 61 (1976)).  The court does, however, have “jurisdiction to determine whether [it has] jurisdiction over a particular case” (Kluger, 83 T.C. 309 (1984)).  Jurisdiction “must be affirmatively shown” by the party invoking the court’s jurisdiction (David Dung Le, M.D., Inc., 114 T.C. 268 (2000), aff’d, 22 F. App’x 837 (9th Cir.  2001)).

To invoke the Tax Court’s jurisdiction, a taxpayer generally has 90 days (150 days “if addressed to a person outside the United States”) from the mailing date of a notice of deficiency to file a petition with the court (Sec. 6213(a)).  Prior cases have held that the filing deadline is “jurisdictional, and equitable tolling does not apply” (Hallmark Research Collective, 159 T.C. 126, 166–67 (2022)).  An extension may be granted if the filing deadline falls on a Saturday, Sunday, or legal holiday in the District of Columbia (Sec.  7503), or if a later date is prescribed by the IRS in the notice of deficiency (Sec.  6213(a)).

Under either of these rules, the deadline for filing the taxpayers’ petition would have fallen on Nov. 25, a Friday.

Sec.  7451(b) provides a further extension if the filing location is inaccessible (added to the Code by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, P.L. 117-58, in 2021).  This rule extends the filing deadline if the “filing location is inaccessible or otherwise unavailable to the general public on the date a petition is due” (Sec.  7451(b)(1)).

If so, the deadline is tolled by the number of days the court was inaccessible plus an additional 14 days.  A filing location includes the office of the clerk of the Tax Court or any online portal made available by the Tax Court for electronic filing of petitions (Sec. 7451(b)(2)).

Holding: The court concluded that Sec.  7451(b) applied since the Tax Court in Washington, D.C., which houses the court’s clerk’s office, was administratively closed on Nov. 25, making it inaccessible to the public, even though the electronic filing system was operational and accessible.

Therefore, this extended the filing deadline by the period the court was inaccessible, i.e., one day, plus the 14-day tolling period mandated by Sec. 7451(b)(1), meaning that the taxpayers’ petition was not due until Dec. 10, 2022. However, since Dec. 10 fell on a Saturday, Sec.  7503 extended the filing deadline to the next day that was not a Saturday, Sunday, or legal holiday, which was Monday, Dec. 12, 2022.

As a result, since the taxpayers mailed their petition to the Tax Court on Nov. 28 and it was received and filed by the court clerk on Dec. 1, the court held that the petition was timely filed, giving the court jurisdiction to hear the case.

■ Sall, 161 T.C. No.  13 (2023) .  John McKinley, CPA, CGMA,

— J. D., LL.M., and Thomas Godwin, CPA, CGMA, Ph.D., are both professors of the practice in accounting and taxation in the SC Johnson College of Business at Cornell University. To comment on this column, contact Paul Bonner, the JofA‘s tax editor.