Posted on 02/24/2009 6:48:39 AM PST by KeyLargo
Rent car in suburbs, pay Chicago?
8% TAX | Enterprise sues city over attempt to force collection
February 24, 2009
BY FRAN SPIELMAN City Hall Reporter
How would you like to rent a car in Waukegan or St. Charles, only to be slapped with the 8 percent "transaction tax" that applies to Chicago car rentals?
Brace yourself. With a burgeoning $50.5 million budget gap, Chicago is reaching into suburban pockets. And Enterprise Rent-a-Car has filed a lawsuit challenging the Daley administration's effort to collect the tax from drivers who rent cars in the suburbs. » Click to enlarge image Enterprise Rent-a-Car has filed a lawsuit challenging the Chicago's effort to collect an 8 percent tax from drivers who rent cars in the suburbs.
The suit was filed last week in Kane County after an administrative ruling by the city's Department of Revenue that City Hall will "presume" that all car rentals in the six-county area are subject to Chicago's 8 percent transaction tax.
To be excused from the tax, the city is requiring rental companies to photocopy customers' driver's licenses and obtain a sworn statement from customers that they won't be spending more than 50 percent of their time driving in Chicago during the rental period. Without that, the city is demanding the companies collect the tax and turn the money over to the city. Audits will be conducted. At least one is already under way.
Enterprise is asking a judge to declare the city's action unconstitutional.
"Can you imagine if all municipalities did that?" said Stan Kaminski, an attorney for Enterprise. "We feel it's an intrusion of privacy to ask for a copy of the driver's license and a sworn affidavit signed under penalty of perjury on where they might hypothetically use the vehicle."
Jennifer Hoyle, a spokeswoman for the city's Law Department, said the tax applies to rentals outside the city "when the vehicles will primarily be used in Chicago."
"We're not asking them to impose the city's tax on all of their transactions," Hoyle said. "We have provided them with an affidavit for their customers to fill out so they can determine whether or not the tax applies."
I hope I live long enough to see these thugs in Chicago go to prison.
Let them 'presume' to kiss my a**.
L
They don’t call it Crook County for nothin’.
Attending a recent funeral in the Phil suburbs, I rented a a car from Enterprise in Delaware County instead of the airport. The rate was approximately 1/2 of the airport rate.
It would have been 380 a week at the airport, and it was only 180 ten miles away in Springfield township.
If the rental place isn’t IN Chicago, NO CHICAGO TAX!!!
That would take away the comsumer’s choice to seek out lower prices driven by lower taxes.
When we rented a car on our last trip to Dallas, we drove close to 25 miles to GARLAND (a Dallas suburb) to get the best deal around - far away from the airport and tourist areas.
What the heck kind of story title is this????
A good trick is to locate a large auto body shop, and you will find the best rental deal available. So when traveling, go to the yellow pages, find a repair shop, and give them a call. Most have rental counters in-house.
Why don’t these rural counties turn around and charge a toll on all roads leading OUT of the city to pay for roads city people drive on?
Also a trucker toll leading INTO the cities, after all, truckloads of heavy freight going into the city to keep their shelves stocked knock the heck out of rural roads.
Better yet, just have surrounding counties build a very high razor wired electric fence all around Chicago and keep all the inmates in.
“A good trick is to locate a large auto body shop, and you will find the best rental deal available. So when traveling, go to the yellow pages, find a repair shop, and give them a call. Most have rental counters in-house.”
I will have to try that.
When I lived in Manhattan, I used to take the train out of town in the direction of my destination to rent cars all of the time. Most often in Connecticut.
Just remember that most body shop courtesy cars are fixed up wrecks with new paint. Don't be suprized when you get the feeling while driving it that the rear wheels are trying to pass the front ones.
Taxation without representation.
Wasn’t taxation without representation an issue in this country once before?
Chicago loves their Dick Daley. And they get it.....................
How is Chicago even aware of a rental that takes place at a rental counter outside of the city? And how does Chicago have the power to tax a rental on the basis that the vehicle is being driven in the city?
This is done in St. Louis, on the pretense that all car rentals are associated with the airport. I’m unaware if it applies to St. Clair and Madison counties in ILL or St. Charles and Jefferson in MO.
“Audits will be conducted. At least one is already under way. “
Under what legal pretense do they audit a company outside the City Limits?
I heard someone on WLS this morning say that he would be in favor of it if people in the suburbs would be allowed to vote in the city of Chicago’s mayoral race.
“Under what legal pretense do they audit a company outside the City Limits?”
Legal pretense? Chicago? ROFL!!
Don’t they usually pretend what they are doing is legal? :)
Chicago is reaching into pockets in all directions to the state line, just like it always has under Mayor Daley 1 and Mayor Daley 2.
Unarmed peasants of Illinois are expected to pay the mayor's tithe yet their vote does not count.
Chicago patronage, the worst form of government.
So when I rented a car in Countryside to drive to Downers Grove because my car was in the shop at Berwyn, Chicago thinks I should have to prove all this to them to keep from paying taxes to them? Who the F does Dick Daley think he is? And why in God’s name would anyone else in government go along with this?
I’m still trying to figure out how Chicago gets their hands on the records of non-Chicago rentals.
They already have toll booths every five feet up there.
I think so too. The suburbs should fight back. Nothing should go in or out of chicago without a toll tax paid to the suburbs, with each suburb charging it’s own tax. I would love it. Teach this petty dictator a lesson
Enterprise doesn’t need to sue. They should refuse to charge the tax.
I researched the city budget and found that according to the budget estimates, on the city government website, the city has many city sales taxes. Some of them can be avoided, by conducting business in other towns. These taxes are the automatic amusement device tax, cigarette tax, employers’ expense tax, home rule municipal retailers’ occupation tax, hotel accommodation tax, liquor tax, motor fuel tax, motor vehicle lessor tax, municipal automobile renting occupation tax, municipal automobile renting use tax, municipal hotel operators’ occupation tax, off-track betting tax and admission fee, parking tax, personal property lease transaction tax, restaurant and other places for eating tax, soft drink tax, and vehicle fuel tax. If you think that the city government receives enough of your money, please conduct more business, in other towns.
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