Jennifer Weidler Karpchuk, senior counsel with Chamberlain, Hrdlicka, White, Williams & Aughtry.
Unprecedented times call for unprecedented measures. For the first time, the City of Philadelphia Department of Revenue (department) is allowing employers to file a bulk return on behalf of their employees for 2020 wage tax refunds and creating a streamlined application for employees to file online. But is all that glitters gold?
As background, Philadelphia maintains a “requirement of employment” test to determine whether a nonresident employee is subject to the wage tax for time worked outside of the city. If a nonresident employee works outside of the city for the employee’s convenience, that individual is still subject to the wage tax. Conversely, if a nonresident employee is working outside of Philadelphia as required by his employer, that individual is not subject to the wage tax for the time spent outside the city. Because of the pandemic, many offices were shuttered and, consequently, employers required their employees to work from home in larger numbers than ever before. The department applied its longstanding rule to the COVID-19 crisis—those individuals forced to work from home by their employer because of the pandemic were not subject to the city’s wage tax. Therefore, an unprecedented number of nonresident employees are entitled to refunds for tax year 2020.
Bulk Submissions for Employers
This content has been archived. It is available through our partners, LexisNexis® and Bloomberg Law.
To view this content, please continue to their sites.
Not a Lexis Subscriber?
Subscribe Now
Not a Bloomberg Law Subscriber?
Subscribe Now
LexisNexis® and Bloomberg Law are third party online distributors of the broad collection of current and archived versions of ALM's legal news publications. LexisNexis® and Bloomberg Law customers are able to access and use ALM's content, including content from the National Law Journal, The American Lawyer, Legaltech News, The New York Law Journal, and Corporate Counsel, as well as other sources of legal information.
For questions call 1-877-256-2472 or contact us at [email protected]
