Armantrout v. Commissioner

67 T.C. 996, 1977 U.S. Tax Ct. LEXIS 135
CourtUnited States Tax Court
DecidedMarch 23, 1977
DocketDocket Nos. 4344-75, 4460-75, 4461-75
StatusPublished
Cited by18 cases

This text of 67 T.C. 996 (Armantrout v. Commissioner) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering United States Tax Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Armantrout v. Commissioner, 67 T.C. 996, 1977 U.S. Tax Ct. LEXIS 135 (tax 1977).

Opinion

Goffe, Judge:

The Commissioner determined deficiencies in the Federal income tax of petitioners as follows:

Petitioners Taxable year Docket No. Deficiency
Richard T. and Lois Armantrout. 1971 4344-75 $258.98
1972 4344-75 628.61
1973 4344-75 1,069.56
Francis H. and Elizabeth Pepper 1973 4460-75 922.17
Llewellyn G. and Ann H. Owens. 1971 4461-75 418.86

Upon joint motion of the parties, these cases were consolidated for trial, briefing, and opinion.

The sole issue for decision is whether petitioners should have included in income amounts paid to their respective children for education expenses by the "Educo” trust which was funded by petitioners’ employer.

FINDINGS OF FACT

Some of the facts have been stipulated. The stipulation of facts, the supplemental stipulation and second supplemental stipulation of facts, and the attached exhibits are incorporated by this reference.

Petitioners Richard T. and Lois Armantrout, husband and wife, who resided in Lake Mills, Wis., at the time the petition was filed herein, filed joint Federal income tax returns for the taxable years 1971, 1972, and 1973 with the Internal Revenue Service Center, Kansas City, Mo. Petitioners Francis H. and Elizabeth Pepper, husband and wife, also residéd in Lake Mills, Wis., at the time of filing their petition herein. The Peppers filed a joint Federal income tax return for the taxable year 1973 with the Internal Revenue Service Center, Kansas City, Mo. Petitioners Llewellyn G. and Ann H. Owens, husband and wife, who resided in Glenview, Ill., at the time of filing their petition herein, filed a joint Federal income tax return for the taxable year 1971 with the Internal Revenue Service Center, Kansas City, Mo.

Hamlin, Inc., a Delaware corporation (Hamlin), is engaged in the business of manufacturing, distributing, and selling electronic components. During the taxable years 1971 through 1973, petitioner Richard T. Armantrout was employed by Hamlin as vice president in charge of marketing. Petitioner Francis H. Pepper was employed as plant manager during the taxable year 1973. Petitioner Llewellyn G. Owens was employed as secretary-treasurer throughout the taxable year 1971.

Educo, Inc. (Educo), a Delaware corporation, is engaged in the business of designing, implementing, and administering college education benefit plans for corporate employers.

Sometime in 1969, petitioner Llewellyn G. Owens noticed an advertisement in the Wall Street Journal which outlined, in a general way, the potential benefits of the Educo plan. Upon subsequent investigation, Mr. Owens suggested that such a plan be implemented by Hamlin, Inc.

On September 2, 1969, Hamlin entered into an agreement with Funds for Education, Inc., a Delaware corporation. Subsequently, on November 17, 1969, Funds for Education changed its corporate name to Educo, Inc.

Pursuant to the agreement, Educo undertook to administer an Educo education plan to provide funds for college expenses for the children of certain key employees of Hamlin. Hamlin, upon becoming a participant of the Educo plan, agreed to make contributions to the Continental Illinois National Bank & Trust Co. of Chicago which acted as trustee under a trust agreement entered into with Educo on December 9, 1969.

Pursuant to the Educo plan, children of Hamlin’s key employees named in the enrollment schedules which formed a part of the plan would be entitled to receive sums from the trustee to defray college education expenses. Upon receipt of the appropriate information from Hamlin, Educo would direct the trustee to pay, in accordance with the enrollment schedule, the expenses incurred by the employees’ children in attending a college or university, trade or vocational school.

The education expenses which could be defrayed under the terms of the plan included:

(1) Tuition, registration, and other fees payable to any college;

(2) Rental of living quarters provided by a college or a reasonable allowance for same, if not so provided;

(3) Cost of meals if provided by a college or by a club, fraternity, sorority, or boarding house, or a reasonable allowance for such meals if not so furnished by any of the foregoing;

(4) Cost of books, supplies, equipment, and other extras required to be purchased in connection with attendance at any such college;

(5) Hospitalization insurance; and

(6) Such other expenses as, in the opinion of Educo, Inc., were necessary and reasonable and directly related to the education of the child.

The Educo plan as implemented by Hamlin provided for a maximum of $10,000 to be made available to the children of any one employee with an upper limit of $4,000 available to any one child. Payments to or on behalf of a child enrolled in the plan were limited during any one year to one-fourth of the total amount scheduled for that child; however, the unused funds of a prior year could be used to defray expenses in a subsequent academic year. Children otherwise qualified who did not utilize any of the available funds before reaching age 21 or within 2 years after completing the 12th grade would be ineligible to participate in the plan.

In adopting the Educo plan, it was Hamlin’s intention to make available sufficient funds to .enable at least two children of each key employee to attend college. Consonant therewith, the plan was in general administered so that $4,000 was scheduled to be received by each of the employee’s two eldest children while $2,000 would be provided to a third younger child; funds not utilized by the older children were in turn made available to younger children, thus it was possible that more than three children of each key employee could ultimately participate in the plan. However, this administrative policy was not required by the terms of the plan and, moreover, prior to the adoption of the first enrollment schedule the employee-parents were given the opportunity to allocate the available funds within the maximum allowed by the plan to their children in amounts different from those described above.

Children would be designated to receive the trust benefits through the use of enrollment schedules which could be changed or amended. Designated to receive benefits pursuant to enrollment schedule I dated October 15, 1969, were the children of petitioners Richard T. Armantrout and Llewellyn G. Owens in the following amounts:

Mary Lynn Armantrout $4,000 Martha G. Owens. $4,000
Thomas Richard Armantrout. 4,000 Lawrence T. Owens. 4,000
Katherine Ann Armantrout. 2,000

Enrollment schedule II dated March 1, 1973, provided that the children of petitioner Francis Pepper were eligible to receive according to the terms of the plan the following amounts:

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Armantrout v. Commissioner
67 T.C. 996 (U.S. Tax Court, 1977)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
67 T.C. 996, 1977 U.S. Tax Ct. LEXIS 135, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/armantrout-v-commissioner-tax-1977.