Yesterday Rich Owings tweeted a sad news, that of the affiliate tax (aka “Amazon tax”) passing the House and Senate in North Carolina:
Less than half an hour ago, Melanie Seery tweeted (highlighting mine):
Today in her blog she also wrote:
It is expected that North Carolina, like Rhode Island, will also have a strict interpretation of the nexus definition. North Carolina can expect terminations from more merchants as word of new nexus definition spreads.
As reported earlier, Amazon [see this post] and Overstock [see this announcement] have already pulled out of North Carolina.
Sad news overall. Especially after everything that has been done by multiple affiliate marketers to fight it.
Details on what appears to be an upcoming legislation in Melanie’s North Carolina Internet Sales Tax Moments Away blog post.
NC Senate and House of Representatives approved the budget bill today, and it is now with the Governor. If signed the Internet sales tax will take effect immediately.
On August 7 2009 the 2009-2011 North Carolina Budget was signed by Governor Beverly Perdue.
IMPORTANT: The new law applies not only to NC-based merchants, but also to those out-of-state merchants that reach $10,000 or more in yearly sales to North Carolina residents through NC affiliates [more here].
Yesterday an Asheville, NC newspaper, Citizen-Times has published an interesting article on the subject (with opinions from NC-based affiliates): State May Sue Web Retailers. As often is the case, the comments under the article are even more interesting.