By Stephen Bevins
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It is February – a month to celebrate love. I love the county I live in, which gets funding from tax determined by the Tangible Personal Property Schedule (TPPS). The TPPS is a listing of all items a business owns or leases that isn’t land, building, or anything attached to the building. The TPPS gives a dollar summary by purchase year of assets in each of the 10 groups. Any additions and disposals to each group are recorded, updating the group totals. Based on these totals, a tax is determined. The TPPS is mailed at year end and is due March 1. Tax notices are mailed in the fall, with payment due after the tax notice is received.
It is good practice to read and learn about the TPPS form and instructions before completing it. In the TPPS instructions, a thorough list is included explaining the breakdown of items in each group. Each of the 10 groups is uniquely specified, so it is important to make a best effort to put each item in the right group. Also, it is good to always review your accounting records to verify that the numbers reported on the TPPS are the same as what you have before making any changes. A good way to verify that is to print an accounting report that matches to the TPPS schedule. Before submitting the TPPS, verify that all numbers submitted match your records and the records listed on the TPPS. Filing process, whether paper or electronic, varies by county. It is wise business practice to keep all TPPS records indefinitely.
Sometimes, owners receive an assessment. In an assessment, a business’ TPPS is verified on-site, in person, by a TPPS assessor. The TPPS assessor verifies that what is on the list is in the business and looks for anything that is not on the list. Anything not on the current list is not having tax collected on it, and the assessor’s goal is to make sure all property is on the list and creating tax revenue. After the assessment, a change notice will be mailed to the business owner, detailing the findings of the auditor and the new proposed values of each group. The owner then has an opportunity to either appeal or accept the findings. Any amended TPPS are due by September 1.
TPPS forms are mailed to the owner of record as of the mailing date. To prevent a forced assessment for the current tax year, it is important to inform the assessor if the business was sold, relocated to a different county, or terminated prior to January 1 of the tax year. Each county is slightly different in their TPPS schedule and whether they are paper filed or electronically filed.
It is important to note that fully depreciated items must be included on the TPPS list. The only way to remove an item from the TPPS list is to physically remove it from the business through disposing it, or, if it is a leased item, by completing the lease duration.
Additional information on the TPPS can be found in the Tangible Personal Property Handbook at the Tennessee Comptroller of the Treasury website at https://comptroller.tn.gov.