Vesta Corp. v. Dept. of Rev.

Oregon Tax Court·Decided March 28, 2022·No. TC-MD 200019G·Unpublished

Opinion

IN THE OREGON TAX COURT

MAGISTRATE DIVISION

Corporation Excise Tax

VESTA CORPORATION, )

)

Plaintiff, ) TC-MD 200019G )

v. )

)

DEPARTMENT OF REVENUE, ) State of Oregon, )

) ORDER ON CROSS-MOTIONS FOR Defendant. ) PARTIAL SUMMARY JUDGMENT

This matter came before the court on the parties’ cross-motions for partial summary judgment. At issue is whether payment processing services performed by third parties under contract with Plaintiff are performed “on behalf of” Plaintiff under ORS 314.665(4) (2009) and former OAR 150-314.665(4)(2) (Aug 31, 2008) for purposes of determining where Plaintiff incurred its costs of performing income-producing activity. The tax years at issue are 2010 and 2011.

I. FACTS

Plaintiff’s clients are certain telecommunications companies (the Telecoms) including AT&T Mobility LLC (the successor to Cingular Wireless, referred to herein as “AT&T”), Sprint, and T-Mobile, all of which offer prepaid wireless services. (Nebel Decl Supp Mot Part Summ J, ¶¶ 7, 13–14.) The Telecoms’ customers buy increments of time or data usage (“Additional Time”) for their mobile devices via credit card, debit card, or electronic payment over the Automated Clearing House (“ACH”) network. (Id., ¶¶ 7, 10.) Plaintiff provides the Telecoms with an “integrated payment processing and fraud prevention service,” whereby the Telecoms “completely outsource their prepaid mobile Telecom customer recharge and payment process.” (Ptf’s Reply at 3.)

ORDER ON CROSS-MOTIONS FOR PARTIAL SUMMARY JUDGMENT TC-MD 200019G 1 of 14

A. Credit Card Payments and Chargebacks Most credit card transactions are conducted under the umbrella of Visa or MasterCard, bank card associations with memberships composed exclusively of financial institutions. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, Comptroller’s Handbook, Merchant Processing, vers. 1.0 (Aug 2014) at 2; 1 Merchants Advisory Group, Know Your Payments!, Transactions Basics, FAQ. 2 The bank card associations enable card transactions across a network of four parties: the cardholder; the merchant; the member bank that issued the credit card (the “issuing bank”); and the member bank (or its third-party processor) under contract with the merchant to acquire payments from issuing banks (the “acquiring bank” or “payment acquirer”). Comptroller’s Handbook at 2. When a card is presented to a merchant, the merchant transmits the card information and transaction amount to its payment acquirer, which forwards that information over the bank card association network to the issuing bank. Id. at 8. The issuing bank approves or declines the transaction, and that decision is transmitted back to the point of sale over the same network. Id. After a transaction is approved, the issuing bank remits funds to the payment acquirer and posts a charge to the cardholder’s account. Id. at 9–10. The payment acquirer then pays the merchant, usually by initiating an ACH credit to the merchant’s local bank deposit account. Id. at 9–10. 3 After the merchant is paid, there is a period of time during which the cardholder may dispute the transaction for various reasons, including fraud. Comptroller’s Handbook at 11. In

1 Available at: https://www.occ.treas.gov/publications-and-resources/publications/comptrollershandbook /files/merchant-processing/index-merchant-processing.html (accessed March 28, 2022).

2 Available at: http://www.knowyourpayments.com/transaction-basics/ (accessed March 28, 2022).

3 Other card issuers—notably American Express, Discover Card, and Diners Club—use a three-party network in which the issuing bank and the payment acquirer are the same entity. Comptroller’s Handbook at 2.

ORDER ON CROSS-MOTIONS FOR PARTIAL SUMMARY JUDGMENT TC-MD 200019G 2 of 14 the case of an unauthorized purchase, the issuing bank begins a chargeback process. Id. at 11– 12. In that process, the payment acquirer credits the issuing bank and, after appropriate investigation, removes the amount of the chargeback from the merchant’s account. Id.

Telecom customers purchase Additional Time in “card-not-present” transactions, which “have a higher incidence of chargebacks, due to unauthorized use, than in-person transactions where a physical card is present.” (Nebel Decl Supp Mot Part Summ J, ¶¶ 10, 12.) B. Vesta’s Service to Telecoms Plaintiff protects its clients from the risk of loss due to chargebacks. (See Nebel Decl Supp Mot Part Summ J, ¶ 12.) It does so by handling requests from Telecom customers to purchase Additional Time, approving or rejecting those requests based on a proprietary software- based risk assessment, submitting information for approved requests to payment acquirers (standing in as the “merchant” in the payment process described above), receiving payment from those payment acquirers, and remitting the proceeds to the Telecoms, net of Plaintiff’s fee. (Id., ¶¶ 11, 19, 20, 23.) Plaintiff stands by its assessment of fraud risk by assuming liability for all chargebacks due to unauthorized card use. (Id., ¶¶ 12, 19.) According to Plaintiff, its assumption of financial risk was “one of the primary marketing and selling points” for its business. (Compl, ¶ 19.)

Each of Plaintiff’s contracts with the Telecoms required it to provide similar services, notwithstanding differences in contract language. Its contract with Cingular (AT&T) required Plaintiff to “collect payments related to Loads from Cingular Customers” while “paying Cingular the Load Amount, regardless of whether the Load Funding Device was used without authorization or the Card issuer issues a chargeback.” (Nebel Decl Supp Mot Part Summ J, Ex 1 at 16.) Its contract with T-Mobile required it to provide “payment processing whereby [Plaintiff]

ORDER ON CROSS-MOTIONS FOR PARTIAL SUMMARY JUDGMENT TC-MD 200019G 3 of 14 accepts end-user customer payments, processes such payments and provides the settlement” while remaining “responsible for paying T-Mobile the Net Amount * * * regardless of whether the end-user customer subsequently claims that the card was used without authorization and the card issuer issues a chargeback.” (Id., Ex 2 at 14.) Its contract with Sprint required Plaintiff to “[a]ct as Merchant of Record (as such term is defined by the Card Associations) with respect to all processed Load Requests” and to “[p]ay the Net Remittance to an account designated by Sprint” while remaining “responsible for paying Sprint for such Load, regardless of whether the Load Funding Device was used without authorization and the Card issuer issues a chargeback.” (Id., Ex 3 at 35.) C. Vesta’s Payment Acquirers During the years at issue, Plaintiff submitted card transactions primarily through two payment acquirers. 4 In 2010, most of Plaintiff’s transactions were submitted to a subsidiary of First National Bank of Omaha (“FNBO”). (Nebel Decl Supp Mot Part Summ J, ¶¶ 24–25.) In 2011, most of the transactions were submitted to Chase Paymentech (“Chase”), a subsidiary of JP Morgan Chase Bank, N.A. (Id.)

The Chase contract is captioned “Select Merchant Payment Card Processing Agreement.”

(Nebel Decl Supp Mot Part Summ J, Ex 4 at 1.) In it, Chase agreed to “process [Plaintiff’s] Transaction Data to facilitate the funds transfer between the various Payment Brands and [Plaintiff].” (Id., Ex 4 at 2.) Upon receiving transaction data from Plaintiff, Chase agreed to provide Plaintiff with “provisional credit” for the amount received by Chase respecting the transaction, net of Chase’s “fees, charges, and discounts,” as well as “all adjustments and

4 Plaintiff is not a financial institution and is not eligible for membership in a bank card association.

(Compl, ¶¶ 23–24.)

ORDER ON CROSS-MOTIONS FOR PARTIAL SUMMARY JUDGMENT TC-MD 200019G 4 of 14

Chargebacks” and a host of other possible charges. (Id., Ex 4 at 3.) Plaintiff undertook to pay Chase any such charges not deducted from the provisional credit. (Id.)

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Vesta Corp. v. Dept. of Rev., (Or. Super. Ct. 2022).

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