In Re Glenn

198 B.R. 106, 1996 Bankr. LEXIS 810, 78 A.F.T.R.2d (RIA) 5854, 1996 WL 387656
CourtUnited States Bankruptcy Court, E.D. Pennsylvania
DecidedJuly 10, 1996
Docket16-13526
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 198 B.R. 106 (In Re Glenn) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering United States Bankruptcy Court, E.D. Pennsylvania primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
In Re Glenn, 198 B.R. 106, 1996 Bankr. LEXIS 810, 78 A.F.T.R.2d (RIA) 5854, 1996 WL 387656 (Pa. 1996).

Opinion

OPINION

DAVID A. SCHOLL, Chief Judge.

A INTRODUCTION

The instant dispute between ROY A. GLENN (“the Debtor”) and the Internal Revenue Service (“the IRS”) involves the right of the IRS to set off a $2,327 1995 federal income tax refund (“the Refund”) for a tax year which ended prior to the Debtor’s Chapter 13 filing on January 12,1996, but for which the return was neither due nor filed at the time that the Debtor’s bankruptcy case had commenced. This dispute can be resolved only by determining whether the Refund was a postpetition obligation of the IRS to the Debtor which could not be set off pursuant to 11 U.S.C. § 553(a), or a prepetition obligation which could be so set off. Despite considerable authority to the contrary, we will adhere to our ruling in In re Hankerson, 133 B.R. 711, 716-17 (Bankr. E.D.Pa.1991), rev’d on other grounds sub nom. Hankerson v. United States Dep’t of Education, 138 B.R. 473 (E.D.Pa.1992), that such a refund, if timely requested and allowed postpetition, arose post-petition. Consequently, we will order the IRS to remit the Refund to the Debtor.

B. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

On June 12,1996, this court filed a Memorandum (“the Memo”), presently reported only at 1996 WL 332405, setting forth the pertinent facts established and the procedural history of the dispute to that date. Rather than reiterate all that was set forth in the Memo, we will attach same as Appendix “A” and proceed forward therefrom. In the Memo, we concluded that the IRS’s effectively permanent retention of the Refund without first securing or obtaining relief from the automatic stay was not a permissible temporary “freeze” of the Refund within the scope of Citizens Bank of Maryland v. Strumpf, — U.S.-, 116 S.Ct. 286,133 L.Ed.2d 258 (1995), but, rather, that the dispute was controlled by the principles of United States v. Norton, 717 F.2d 767 (3d Cir.1983). Under these principles, we allowed the IRS to retain the refund only if it filed a motion to obtain relief from the automatic stay to set off the refund on or before June 19, 1996, and established, at a hearing on any such motion scheduled on June 27, 1996, that it would not be adequately protected in its rights to the Refund at that hearing.

By this order, we made clear our belief that the IRS would have to properly establish its right to the Refund to effect such a permanent “freeze” against it. We also hoped that the parties would perceive the weaknesses in each of their respective positions and amicably resolve this dispute. The IRS did timely file the motion for relief from the stay and, although the parties reported, at the June 27, 1996, hearing, that they had attempted to resolve the dispute, they also reported that they had been unsuccessful in these efforts.

The Debtor was briefly called at the hearing and testified that he had filed his 1995 income tax return very early, on or about January 22, 1996, as part of an application to obtain a refund anticipation loan. He was informed by the lender that the IRS had approved the Refund but had refused to remit it to him because of his outstanding prepetition delinquency to the IRS in late February 1996, or early March 1996, whereupon his loan application was denied. The Debtor also conceded that his Chapter 13 plan, even if confirmed at the first listed confirmation hearing on September 3, 1996, contemplated payment of only the secured ($4,170) and priority ($2,200) portions of the IRS’s claim. Therefore, the plan did not purport to repay the sizable general unsecured portion of the IRS’s claim ($19,373.36), and that portion was hence “unprotected.”

The bottom line of the discussion was that both parties agreed that, given this court’s interpretation of Strumpf and Norton, as expressed in the Memo, the resolution of this dispute turned on whether this court would continue to follow its reasoning regarding the *108 date of accrual of a federal tax refund in Hankerson or would bow to the emerging contrary majority. This court was therefore obliged to carefully review its reasoning in Hankerson, and that of the contrary authorities.

a DISCUSSION: THIS COURT ADHERES TO HANKERSON AND CONCLUDES THAT THE INSTANT REFUND IS A POSTPETITION OBLIGATION NOT SUBJECT TO SET-OFF

In Hankerson we relied principally on the language of 26 U.S.C. § 6407, an Internal Revenue Code (“IRC”) section bearing the title of what we believed to be the matter at issue, ie., the “Date of allowance of refund or credit.” That IRC section provides as follows:

The date on which the Secretary first authorizes the scheduling of an overassessment in respect of any internal revenue tax shall be considered as the date of allowance of refund or credit in respect of such tax.

This IRC section establishes the date when the overassessment is “authorized,” ie., finally determined to be due, as the date of “allowance” of the refund. This statute appeared to us then, and still appears now, to decide the critical question of when a tax refund is deemed allowed in and of itself.

As further support for the conclusion that the date that a refund is authorized is the date of its allowance, we also stated in Hankerson, 133 B.R. at 716, as follows:

As Judge Markovitz correctly pointed out in [In re Harbaugh, 99 B.R. 671 (Bankr. W.D.Pa.) (“Harbaugh I”), rev’d, 1989 WL 139254, (W.D.Pa. Oct. 13, 1989) (“Harbaugh II”), aff'd, 902 F.2d 1560 (3d Cir. 1990),] the IRS can not determine the existence of a tax overpayment until a return has been filed, mainly because a refund is dependent on many factors beyond the knowledge of the IRS on the last day of the tax year, e.g., the amount of wages withheld during the tax year and the existence of any creditors or exemptions and income from other sources. Id. [at 676]. Much of this information is not available to the taxpayer or the IRS until after the close of the tax year. Additionally, taxes withheld at the source during the tax year are not deemed paid until the date that the taxpayer’s return is due. 26 U.S.C. § 6513. To hold that a refund arises on the last day of the taxable year is contrary to these provisions of the ... IRC ... and is impractical in terms of the actual determination of the refund.

We also noted later in Hankerson, id. at 716-17, that the establishment of a date later than the end of the tax year as the date that refund should be deemed to be allowed is suggested by 26 U.S.C. § 6611(b), which provides that interest on a refund does not accrue until a return is filed.

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198 B.R. 106, 1996 Bankr. LEXIS 810, 78 A.F.T.R.2d (RIA) 5854, 1996 WL 387656, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/in-re-glenn-paeb-1996.