Dear [firstname],
Thank you for signing up to receive updates from the Office of the Comptroller. Our office is pleased to share the following technical bulletin regarding our acceptance of petitions for Private Letter Rulings (PLRs) beginning in January 2024. More detailed information, including the full checklist of requirements for submitting a PLR, can be found on our website under Technical Bulletin 44: Private Letter Rulings.
ANNAPOLIS, Md. (January 2, 2024) ̶̶ Comptroller Brooke Lierman has announced that the agency will begin accepting private letter rulings (PLRs) petitions on Tuesday, January 2, 2024.
In the 2022 General Assembly Session, Comptroller (then-delegate) Lierman sponsored HB366, which established a Legal Division within the Office of the Comptroller to provide detailed and expanded guidance to taxpayers, including PLRs.
Private Letter Rulings are an important tool for taxpayers seeking certainty of tax treatment when they take a particular tax position on complex matters that are not addressed in other guidance. Because a PLR is binding on the Comptroller, the taxpayer has financial certainty regarding the transaction that is the subject of the PLR, which reduces financial risk. A PLR is binding on the Comptroller for seven years unless revoked, modified, or void.
In September, the Legal Division drafted proposed regulations to explain the PLR process and submitted them to the Joint Committee for Administrative, Executive, and Legislative Review (AELR). As required, the proposed regulations were published in November in the Maryland Register. Final regulations will be published in the December 29, 2023 edition of the Maryland Register, and will become final as of January 8, 2024.
How does it work?
- A petition may be submitted by a party to the transaction or an authorized representative such as an attorney, agent, or person designated by a petitioner to represent them in a petition for a PLR. If using a representative, a completed Maryland Form 548 Power of Attorney must be filed with the petition.
- A person who is a party to a transaction may be an individual, receiver, trustee, guardian, personal representative, fiduciary, or representative, a partnership, firm, association, corporation, other entity, a governmental entity, or a unit of instrumentality of a governmental entity.
- After receiving and reviewing a petition, the Comptroller’s Office may ask for additional information, such as missing components for the petition, documents or briefings, and to clarify facts. If the required information is not submitted by a set due date and if other factors are involved, the Comptroller may deny a PLR.
- Upon issuance, a PLR is binding on the Comptroller for a period of 7 years.
- The Comptroller will publish a redacted or anonymized version of a PLR that the Comptroller determines may be of interest to the public.
Although these published copies are not binding on the Comptroller as to any person other than the petitioner, members of the public may regard them as informal, non-binding guidance.
Petitions may be submitted at: CompMDLegal@marylandtaxes.gov.
