General Management Corp. v. Commissioner

46 B.T.A. 738, 1942 BTA LEXIS 825
CourtUnited States Board of Tax Appeals
DecidedMarch 24, 1942
DocketDocket No. 106487.
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 46 B.T.A. 738 (General Management Corp. v. Commissioner) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering United States Board of Tax Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
General Management Corp. v. Commissioner, 46 B.T.A. 738, 1942 BTA LEXIS 825 (bta 1942).

Opinion

[745]*745OPINION.

Aeundeul :

The only issue before us is whether or not petitioner was a personal holding company in the taxable year within the purview of section 402 of the Revenue Act of 1938.1 Another issue [746]*746relating to the deduction of personal property taxes, which was raised by the pleadings, was abandoned by petitioner at the hearing.

There is no dispute concerning the ownership of stock of petitioner. During the taxable year petitioner’s entire outstanding stock was owned by three individuals. The stock ownership requirement of section 402 (a) is therefore met and petitioner must be deemed to be a personal holding company unless it has proved that less than the statutory percentage of its gross income in the taxable year was personal holding company income. It is clear that if 80 percent of petitioner’s gross income consists of personal holding company income, petitioner is a personal holding company.

The amount of petitioner’s gross income for the taxable year has been vigorously disputed by petitioner and respondent. Eespondent contends that the sum of $48,162.31, the amount shown as gross income on petitioner’s income and excess profits tax return for the taxable year, is the gross income of petitioner for the taxable year. Petitioner argues that the amount reported on the return must be increased by certain amounts which petitioner erroneously excluded from gross income. We have found as a fact that petitioner’s gross income for the taxable year aggregated $60,839.43. Petitioner claims that two of the items comprising the gross income of petitioner, namely, the sum of $24,000 accrued under the United contract and the sum of $10,398.42 accrued under the Magill contract, were not personal holding company income as defined by section 403 of the Eevenue Act of 1938. Eespondent argues that these amounts were received from personal service contracts as defined by section 403 (e) of the Eevenue Act of 1938.2 Since the sum of these two amounts exceeds 50 percent of petitioner’s gross income for the taxable year, we shall examine each of these items to determine whether either comes within the. statutory definition of personal holding company income.

We are of the opinion that the amounts accrued by petitioner for services rendered under the United contract constitute personal holding company income. Section 403 (e) provides that amounts received under contracts to furnish personal service are personal holding company income where some person other than the taxpayer corporation has the right to designate, by name or description, the individual [747]*747who is to perform the services or where the individual who is to perform the services is designated by name or description in the contract. This provision applies only where the individual who may be or is so designated owns 25 percent or more of the outstanding stock of the taxpayer corporation. Gillam owned more than 25 percent of the stock of petitioner and was specifically designated in the contract between petitioner and United, dated February 11, 1987, as a person to perform personal services. That contract provided that the compensation of $2,000 per month should include the services of Gillam as comptroller, that Gillam as comptroller should continue to supervise the fiscal operations of United, and that “In the event that the said Grant Gillam shall die or shall become incapacitated to such extent as to make it impossible for him to continue as Comptroller of the Corporation and the Company is within three months thereafter unable to supply an individual for Comptroller who is acceptable to the Corporation, this agreement may, at the option of the Corporation, be terminated.”

While the contract provides that petitioner furnish monthly statements to United, prepare budgets, and submit suggestions for improvement of United’s profit and financial position, the record leaves us in no doubt that the person for whose services United was paying so large a sum was Gillam. In spite of the testimony of the secretary-treasurer of petitioner to the effect that a large portion of the services furnished by petitioner was not performed by Gillam, we believe that his services were the important ones so far as United was concerned. Gillam, together with his sister, who was not active in petitioner’s operation, owned 90 percent of petitioner’s stock during the taxable year. He received a salary of $25,000 a year from petitioner, whereas the total of all other salaries paid by petitioner in the taxable year, including those paid to petitioner’s • other officers, was $12,520.94. The wide disparity between Gillam’s and the others’ salaries, the fact that Gillam’s services as comptroller are specifically designated in the United contract, and the provision of the United contract allowing termination of the contract by United in the event of Gillam’s death and the failure of petitioner to find another individual satisfactory to United, are clearly indicative that United entered into the contract so that it might receive Gillam’s services. We hold that the United contract was a personal service contract within the meaning of section 403 (e) and that amounts accrued thereunder in the taxable year constitute personal holding company income.

The evidence as to the nature of the Magill contract leads us to the conclusion that the income received thereunder is not personal holding company income within the meaning of the statute. But the [748]*748determination of this point in petitioner’s favor still leaves more than 80 percent in what the statute defines as personal holding company income. The items of interest in the sum of $1,091.57, capital gains in the sum of $14,931, dividends in the sum of $6,223, directors’ fees in the sum of $450, and amounts received on final liquidation of the Chicago Armored Car Co. in the sum of $3,745.44 are of the types of personal holding company income enumerated in section 403 of the Revenue Act of 1938, and petitioner made no claim in its briefs to the contrary. The sum of these amounts and that received by petitioner under the United contract aggregates $50,441.01, or 82.85+ percent of the total gross income of petitioner. Petitioner, therefore, was a personal holding company in the taxable year.

Petitioner contends, however, that its gross income for the taxable year includes the sum of $3,417.59 which, it claims, constitutes reimbursement for services and facilities furnished by petitioner to the syndicate in accordance with an agreement between petitioner, the syndicate, and Earl Lowe. Petitioner argues that a reimbursement for the use of facilities has been held to be gross income by us in the cases of Kresge Department Stores, Inc., 44 B. T. A. 1210, and Andrew Jergens Co., 40 B. T. A. 868.

The record discloses that petitioner did not stand to gain, directly or indirectly, from the arrangement for Lowe’s services. The agreement, the entries in petitioner’s books, and the deduction of the syndicate’s 76 percent of the consolidation expenses on the syndicate’s 1938 return indicate that the traveling expenses, rent, salary, and financial expenses, aggregating $3,417.59, were the expenses of the syndicate. As the presiding Member indicated at the hearing, petitioner has attempted to rewrite its books in the light of the later knowledge that a deficiency has been determined. We are of the opinion that there is no justification for such rewriting.

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Related

General Management Corp. v. Commissioner
46 B.T.A. 738 (Board of Tax Appeals, 1942)

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Bluebook (online)
46 B.T.A. 738, 1942 BTA LEXIS 825, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/general-management-corp-v-commissioner-bta-1942.