Franchisors collect weekly or monthly "franchise fees." In many cases, fees are for particular services, such as marketing assistance or IT support. In franchising, the parties may be in any number of different states: for example, a franchisor may be headquartered in California, provide IT support from Texas to a franchisee in Florida, and receive payments at an office in Washington. Which states may tax the franchisor on franchise fees, and in what proportion?

In Upper Moreland Township. v. 7-Eleven, the convenience store franchisor provided advertising services (store signage development) and information technology services to franchisees. Advertising services were provided from Texas. Information technology services were provided from Massachusetts. Franchisees in Pennsylvania and New England sent their payments to a 7-Eleven regional office in a Pennsylvania town where 7-Eleven also had one corporate store and one franchisee-owned store.

The town imposed "Business Privilege Taxes" (BPTs) at a rate of 3.5 mills on gross receipts of "[e]very person engaging in a business ... in the Township." 7-Eleven paid the tax on activities of its corporate store in the town, but not on fees collected at that office from franchisees. After an audit, the town assessed 7-Eleven over a million dollars for unpaid BPTs, interest, and penalties.

7-Eleven challenged the constitutionality of the assessment. A Pennsylvania court relied on a 1970s- era U.S. Supreme Court decision, Complete Auto Transit, Inc. v. Brady (1977), to determine if a local tax on interstate commerce is constitutionally permissible. To be "fairly apportioned," as Brady requires, the local tax must be "externally consistent." To be externally consistent, a tax must apply to "only that 'portion of the revenues from the interstate activity which reasonably reflects the instate component of the activity being taxed.'" A tax does not meet this standard if the amount of income taxed is "disproportionate to the business transacted by the taxpayer in that municipality."

Applying the Brady rule, the Pennsylvania court found the town's assessment was unconstitutional because it was not fairly apportioned to reflect the location of the various interstate activities that generated the 7-Eleven service charges. 7-Eleven just received payments in the town, but the rest of the activities occurred elsewhere. The court remanded the case to the town for a "constitutional recalculation of the assessment."

A franchisor may consider using constitutional limits on local tax powers to protest some municipal taxes. It may also be useful to identify as many components of its interstate commerce activity as it can in locales with lower tax rates.

Read: Upper Moreland Twp. v. 7 Eleven, Inc. 144 CD 2016, before the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court