E-filed Tax Court petition’s completed signature block is valid

The Tax Court held a completed signature block of petitions created with an online petition generator feature of the court’s DAWSON electronic filing and case management system satisfies the petitions’ signature requirement.

Facts: In July 2024, married taxpayers Robert Donlan Jr. and Kegan Donlan received a notice of deficiency from the IRS instructing them that they had until Oct. 21, 2024, to file a Tax Court petition contesting the deficiency. On Oct. 21, 2024, the Donlans used the Tax Court’s Docket Access Within a Secure Online Network (DAWSON) online petition generator to electronically file their petition with the court. Given that the petition was filed online, it did not bear the couple’s handwritten signatures or facsimiles of them. Instead, the petition contained a signature block with the names and contact information for each of the Donlans.

In December 2024, the IRS filed a motion to dismiss the case for lack of jurisdiction, arguing that the “document filed as a petition in this case was not signed by either taxpayer” and that “[t]he Tax Court does not have jurisdiction to review a petition unless it is signed by the taxpayer, or someone lawfully authorized to act as petitioner’s counsel.”

Issues: The issue before the court was whether a person’s name on a signature block on a paper that the person authorized to be filed electronically constitutes the person’s signature.

Taxpayers have two options to electronically file a petition with the Tax Court. They may do so by filling out a Form 2, Petition (Simplified Form), which is available on the court’s website, and filing the completed form by uploading it in DAWSON, or by creating and electronically filing a petition with DAWSON’s online petition generator. Petitions created using the online petition generator are identical in all material respects to Form 2 but are not identical in appearance. Form 2 contains a space for a handwritten signature. Given the nature of the online petition generator, however, petitions created using it do not allow for handwritten signatures. Instead, “the petition has a signature block without a signature” that “states the names and contact information of each taxpayer, the same as Form 2.” The Donlans filed their petition using the online petition generator; therefore, their petition did not bear handwritten signatures.

Rule 34 of the Tax Court Rules of Practice and Procedure governs petitions and states, “For the signature requirement of petitions filed electronically, see Rule 23(a)(3) and the Court’s electronic filing instructions on the Court’s website.” Rule 23(a)(3) states, “A person’s name on a signature block on a paper that the person authorized to be filed electronically, and that is so filed, constitutes the person’s signature.” Additionally, the court’s Self-Represented (Pro Se) Electronic Filing Instructions reiterate Rule 23(a)(3), stating, “The combination of DAWSON username (email address) and password serves as the signature of the individual filing the document.” If both spouses are petitioners, the instructions state, “If you chose to auto-generate a Petition in DAWSON and your spouse has authorized you to file an electronic petition, then the signature block on the petition auto-generated by DAWSON will serve as your spouse’s signature.”

Holding: The Tax Court held that Rule 23(a)(3) deems “a taxpayer’s name on a signature block of a document that the taxpayer authorized to be filed electronically to be the taxpayer’s signature.” Similarly, petitions created with DAWSON’s online petition generator “include each petitioning taxpayer’s name as part of a signature block, thus satisfying this requirement.” As a result, the court held that the Donlans’ petition, having been created with the online petition generator, had been signed by both of them and denied the IRS’s motion to dismiss.

• Donlan, 164 T.C. No. 3 (2025)

Matthew Geiszler, Ph.D., is a lecturer in accounting in the Brooks School of Public Policy, and John McKinley, CPA, CGMA, J.D., LL.M., is a professor of the practice in accounting and taxation in the SC Johnson College of Business, both at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y. To comment on this column, contact Paul Bonner, the JofA‘s tax editor.