(a) Upon every person engaging or continuing within the City in the business of selling any tangible property whatsoever, real or personal, including the sale of food in hotels, restaurants, cafeterias, confectioneries and other public eating houses and wholesale sales from a rolling stockpile, except sales of any person engaging or continuing in the business of horticulture, agriculture or grazing, or selling stocks, bonds, or other evidence of indebtedness, there is hereby levied, and shall be collected, a tax equal to .25 percent of the gross income of the business; except, therein the case of selling at wholesale, the tax shall be equal to .15 percent of the gross income of the business.
(b) Gross income or gross proceeds of sales derived from sales within West Virginia, which is not taxed or taxable by any other municipality are included in the measure of City business and occupation tax if the sales are either directed from a City location or the taxpayer's principal West Virginia office is located in the City. Without limiting the generality of the foregoing, when the taxpayer has only one office location and this office is located within the municipal limits of the City and its activities elsewhere in West Virginia are neither taxed nor taxable by another municipality, the gross income or gross proceeds from those activities are taxable by the City.
(c) A person exercising any privilege taxable under this article, and engaging in the business of selling his manufactured products in the City, shall be required to make returns of the gross proceeds of such wholesale sales and pay the tax imposed by this section at the rate of .15 percent for the privilege of engaging in the business of selling such manufactured products in the City.
(d) All sales of real estate (such as by a speculative builder) are sales at retail and must be reported accordingly. On sales of realty, the status of the purchaser or the intention or use made of the property by the purchaser is of no consequence to the vendor's tax status. To illustrate; where a speculative builder constructs apartment buildings which he later sells to a tax exempt entity, such sales must be reported at retail on the tax return of the speculative builder.
(e) Casual sales of real estate are not taxable to the vendor.
(f) Sales of tangible personal property made by vendors to persons engaging in exempt business activities (e.g., non profit hospitals and the activities of agriculture, horticulture, grazing) are not exempt sales and the gross income derived from such sales must be reported by the vendor under the retail classification. This rule results from the fact that the purchaser (non-profit hospital, farmer, etc.) is not engaged in a business subject to the municipal business and occupation tax.
(g) All sales made through vending machines are sales at retail. The term "vending machines" means and includes only those machines which, through the insertion of a coin of a specified amount, will return to the vendee a predetermined specific article of merchandise. It includes, but is not limited to, machines which vend cigarette, toilet articles, sandwiches, beverages, candies, confections, et cetera.
(h) Persons domiciled outside the City limits of the City who solicit sales within the City and sell tangible personal property of the City are doing business in the City, irrespective of the domicile of such persons irrespective of whether or not such persons maintain a permanent place of business in the City and irrespective of how a sales order is transmitted or processed. If an order is placed in connection with solicitation by a representative (regardless whether there is an employment or agency relationship or whether acting as an independent contractor) who solicits orders within the City, and the tangible personal property is to be delivered in the City, then the gross proceeds of such sales are included in the measure of the City's business and occupation tax.
(Ord. 2005-06-03. Passed 3-20-06.)