Team Specialty Products

04-02

Sometime after purchasing Team Specialty Products, Inc., the new owners discovered that their bookkeeping staff had failed to file an application for the technology jobs tax credit for the period January through December, 2001. The company’s new CPA completed an application for the basic and additional technology jobs tax credits for the 2001 calendar year and submitted it to the Department in September 2003. The Department denied the application as untimely, and the Taxpayer protested the denial. The Taxpayer argued that the one-year period for filing an application for the technology jobs tax credits provided in Section 7-9F-9(A) NMSA 1978 is optional rather than mandatory due to the use of the word “may” in the statutory passage stating that a taxpayer “may apply for approval of a credit within one year following the end of the calendar year in which the qualified expenditure was made.” The Taxpayer also maintained that the Department has discretion to grant the company an extension of time to file its application because the company had good cause for the delay. Held: The one-year limitation period set out in Section 7-9F-9(A) NMSA 1978 is mandatory, and no provision for allowing the Department to extend the application deadline is contained in the Technology Jobs Tax Credit Act or the Tax Administration Act. Protest denied.