ELDs and CA Sales & Use Tax

California sales and use tax generally applies to motor carrier rolling stock.  However, the state has a somewhat complicated regulatory method by which a carrier can get a use tax exemption on equipment on which it takes delivery outside the state, which it first uses outside the state, and, if it brings the equipment into California within a year of purchase, more than half the miles that equipment travels during the following six months is in interstate or foreign commerce.  That regulation has not changed, but the new California Department of Tax & Fee Administration recently issued a notice to the effect that since interstate carriers are now required to equip their trucks with electronic logging devices, the records produced by their ELDs should be useful in supporting claims for this use tax exemption.  But the department cautions that while the U.S. DOT only requires ELD records to be kept for six months, California has up to eight years to audit claims of use tax exemptions.  We suspect that may mean that carriers claiming use tax exemptions for their equipment had better keep those records the full eight years, or risk having their exemptions denied by the state.  Dept. of Tax & Fee Admin., Special Notice L-548, issued May 2018, and online by clicking here.