For the purpose of this chapter, the following definitions shall apply unless the context clearly indicates or requires a different meaning.
ACTED RESPONSIBLY. The taxpayer: exercised the level of reasonable care that a prudent person would exercise under the circumstances in determining the filing obligations for the business; and undertook significant steps to avoid or mitigate the failure, such as requesting appropriate extensions (where applicable), attempting to prevent a foreseeable impediment, acting to remove an impediment once it occurred, and promptly rectifying a failure once the impediment was removed or the failure discovered.
AFFILIATED GROUP.
(1) One or more chains of corporations subject to inclusion connected through stock ownership with a common parent corporation, which is a corporation subject to inclusion if:
(a) Stock possessing at least 80% of the voting power of all classes of stock and at least 80% of each class of the nonvoting stock of each of the corporations subject to inclusion, except the common parent corporation, is owned directly by one or more of the other corporations subject to inclusion; and
(b) The common parent corporation directly owns stock possessing at least 80% of the voting power of all classes of stock and at least 80% of each class of the nonvoting stock of at least one of the other subject to inclusion corporations. As used in this section, the term “stock” does not include nonvoting stock which is limited and preferred as to dividends; the term CORPORATION SUBJECT TO INCLUSION means any corporation within the AFFILIATED GROUP irrespective of the state or country of its incorporation; and the term “receipts” includes gross receipts and gross income.
(2) Two or more corporations if five or fewer persons who are individuals, estates, or trusts own stock possessing:
(a) At least 80% of the total combined voting power of all classes of stock entitled to vote or at least 80% of the total value of shares of all classes of the stock of each corporation; and
(b) More than 50% of the total combined voting power of all classes of stock entitled to vote or more than 50% of the total value of shares of all classes of stock of each corporation, taking into account the stock ownership of each such person only to the extent such stock ownership is identical with respect to each such corporation.
(3) When one or more of the corporations subject to inclusion, including the common parent corporation, is a nonstock corporation, the term “stock” shall refer to the nonstock corporation membership or membership voting rights, as is appropriate to the context.
ASSESSMENT. A determination as to the proper rate of tax, the measure to which the tax rate is applied, and ultimately the amount of tax, including additional or omitted tax, that is due. An ASSESSMENT shall include a written assessment made pursuant to notice by the assessing official or a self-assessment made by a taxpayer upon the filing of a return or otherwise not pursuant to notice. ASSESSMENTS shall be deemed made by an assessing official when a written notice of ASSESSMENT is delivered to the taxpayer by the assessing official or an employee of the assessing official, or mailed to the taxpayer at his or her last known address. SELF-ASSESSMENTS shall be deemed made when a return is filed, or if no return is required, when the tax is paid. A return filed or tax paid before the last day prescribed by ordinance for filing or payment shall be deemed to be filed or paid on the last day specified for the filing of a return or the payment of tax, as the case may be.
ASSESSOR or ASSESSING OFFICIAL. The Town Treasurer.
BASE YEAR. The calendar year preceding the license year, except for contractors subject to the provisions of VA Code § 58.1-3715, or unless this chapter provides for a different period for measuring the gross receipts of a business, such as for beginning businesses or to allow an option to use the same fiscal year as for federal income tax purposes.
BROKER. An agent of a buyer or a seller who buys or sells stocks, bonds, commodities, or services, usually on a commission basis.
BUSINESS. A course of dealing that requires the time, attention, and labor of the person so engaged for the purpose of earning a livelihood or profit. It implies a continuous and regular course of dealing, rather than an irregular or isolated transaction. A person may be engaged in more than one BUSINESS. The following acts shall create a rebuttable presumption that a person is engaged in a BUSINESS:
(1) Advertising or otherwise holding oneself out to the public as being engaged in a particular BUSINESS; or
(2) Filing tax returns, schedules, and documents that are required only of persons engaged in a trade or BUSINESS.
CARNIVAL. An aggregation of shows, amusements, concessions, eating places, and riding devices or any of them, operated together on one lot or street or on contiguous lots or streets, moving from place to place, whether or not they are owned and actually operated by separate persons.
COMMODITY. Staples such as wool, cotton, and the like, which are traded on a commodity exchange and on which there is trading in futures.
CONTRACTOR. As prescribed in VA Code § 58.1-3714(B), whether such work is done or offered to be done by day labor, general contract, or subcontract.
DEALER. Any person engaged in the business of buying and selling securities for his or her own account, but does not include a bank, or any person insofar as he or she buys or sells securities for his or her own account, either individually or in some fiduciary capacity, but not as part of a regular business.
DEFINITE PLACE OF BUSINESS. An office or a location at which occurs a regular and continuous course of dealing for 30 consecutive days or more. A DEFINITE PLACE OF BUSINESS for a person engaged in business may include a location leased or otherwise obtained from another person on a temporary or seasonal basis and real property leased to another. A person’s residence shall be deemed to be a DEFINITE PLACE OF BUSINESS if there is no DEFINITE PLACE OF BUSINESS maintained elsewhere and the person is not subject to licensure as a peddler or itinerant merchant.
DIRECT SELLER. Any person who:
(1) Engages in the trade or business of selling or soliciting the sale of consumer products primarily in private residences and maintains no public location for the conduct of such business;
(2) Receives remuneration for such activities, with substantially all of such remuneration being directly related to sales or other sales-oriented services rather than to the number of hours worked; and
(3) Performs such activities pursuant to a written contract between such person and the person for whom the activities are performed and such contract provides that such person will not be treated as an employee with respect to such activities for federal tax purposes.
EVENTS BEYOND THE TAXPAYER’S CONTROL. Includes, but is not limited to: the unavailability of records due to fire or other casualty; the unavoidable absence (e.g., due to death or serious illness) of the person with the sole responsibility for tax compliance; or the taxpayer’s reasonable reliance in good faith upon erroneous written information from the Assessing Official, who was aware of the relevant facts relating to the taxpayer’s business when he or she provided the erroneous information.
FINANCIAL SERVICES. The buying, selling, handling, managing, investing, and providing of advice regarding money, credit, securities, and other investments and shall include the service for compensation by a credit agency, an investment company, a broker or dealer in securities and commodities or a security or commodity exchange, unless such service is otherwise provided for in this chapter. Those engaged in rendering FINANCIAL SERVICES include, but without limitation, the following: buying installment receivables; chattel mortgage financing; consumer financing; credit card services; credit unions; factors; financing accounts receivable; industrial loan companies; installment financing; inventory financing; loan or mortgage brokers; loan or mortgage companies; safety deposit box companies; security and commodity brokers and services; stockbroker; and working capital financing.
GROSS RECEIPTS. The whole, entire, total receipts attributable to the licensed privilege, without deduction, except as may be limited by the provisions of VA Code §§ 58.1-3700 et seq.
ITINERANT VENDOR. Any person who engages in, does, or transacts any temporary or transient business in the town and who, for the purpose of carrying on such business, occupies any location for a period of less than one year.
ITINERANT VENDOR EVENT. Any date when any combination of five or more itinerant vendors engage in, do, or transact any temporary or transient business under common sponsorship.
LICENSE YEAR. The calendar year for which a license is issued for the privilege of engaging in business.
PEDDLER. Any person who shall carry from place to place any goods, wares, or merchandise, which he or she offers to sell or barter or actually sells or barters.
PEDDLER AT WHOLESALE. Any person who sells or offers to sell goods, wares, or merchandise to licensed dealers, other than at a definite place of business, operated by the seller, and at the time of such sale or exposure for sale delivers or offers to deliver the goods, wares, or merchandise to the buyer. For purposes of this definition, any delivery made on the day of sale shall be construed as a DELIVERY AT THE TIME OF SALE.
PERSONAL SERVICES. Rendering for compensation any repair, personal, business, or other services not specifically classified as “financial, real estate or professional service” under this chapter, or rendered in any other business or occupation not specifically classified in this chapter unless exempted from local license tax by VA Code Title 58.1.
PROFESSIONAL SERVICES. Services performed by architects, attorneys at law, certified public accountants, dentists, engineers, land surveyors, surgeons, veterinarians, and practitioners of the healing arts (the arts and sciences dealing with the prevention, diagnosis, treatment, and cure or alleviation of human physical or mental ailments, conditions, diseases, pain, or infirmities) and such occupations, and no others, as the State Department of Taxation may list in the BPOL guidelines promulgated pursuant to VA Code § 58.1-3701. The Department shall identify and list each occupation or vocation in which a professed knowledge of some department of science or learning, gained by a prolonged course of specialized instruction and study, is used in its practical application to the affairs of others, either advising, guiding, or teaching them, and in serving their interests or welfare in the practice of an art or science founded on it. The word “profession” implies attainments in professional knowledge as distinguished from mere skill, and the application of knowledge to uses for others rather than for personal profit.
PURCHASES. All goods, wares, and merchandise received for sale at each definite place of business of a wholesale merchant. The term shall also include the cost of manufacture of all goods, wares, and merchandise manufactured by any wholesale merchant and sold or offered for sale. A wholesale merchant may elect to report the gross receipts from the sale of manufactured goods, wares, and merchandise if it cannot determine the cost of manufacture or chooses not to disclose the cost of manufacture.
REAL ESTATE SERVICES. Providing a service with respect to the purchase, sale, lease, rental, or appraisal of real property unless the service is otherwise specifically provided for in this chapter and such services include, but are not limited to, the following: appraisers of real estate; escrow agents, real estate; fiduciaries, real estate; lessors of real property; real estate agents, brokers and managers; real estate selling agents; and rental agents for real estate.
RETAILER or RETAIL MERCHANT. Any person who sells goods, wares, and merchandise for use or consumption by the purchaser or for any purpose other than resale by the purchaser, but does not include sales at wholesale to institutional, commercial, and industrial users.
SECURITY. Has the same meaning as in the Securities Act (VA Code §§ 13.1-501 et seq.) or in similar laws of the United States regulating the sale of securities.
SERVICES. Things purchased by a customer that do not have physical characteristics, or are not goods, wares, or merchandise.
SPONSOR. Any person that organizes an itinerant vendor event or solicits and receives applications from itinerant vendors for participation in such an event.
WHOLESALER or WHOLESALE MERCHANT. Any person who sells wares and merchandise for resale by the purchaser, including sales when the goods, wares, and merchandise will be incorporated into goods and services for sale, and also includes sales to institutional, commercial, government, and industrial users that, because of the quantity, price, or other terms indicate that they are consistent with sales at wholesale.
(1998 Code, § 14-36)