Section 423.15. General sourcing rules.

  All sales of products, except those sales enumerated in section 423.16, shall be sourced according to this section by sellers obligated to collect Iowa sales and use tax. The sourcing rules described in this section apply to sales of tangible personal property, digital goods, and all services other than telecommunications services. This section only applies to determine a seller’s obligation to pay or collect and remit a sales or use tax with respect to the seller’s sale of a product. This section does not affect the obligation of a purchaser or lessee to remit tax on the use of the product to the taxing jurisdictions in which the use occurs. A seller’s obligation to collect Iowa sales tax or Iowa use tax only occurs if the sale is sourced to this state. Whether Iowa sales tax applies to a sale sourced to Iowa shall be determined based on the location at which the sale is consummated by delivery or, in the case of a service, where the first use of the service occurs.

  1.  Sales, excluding leases or rentals, of products shall be sourced as follows:

  a.  When the product is received by the purchaser at a business location of the seller, the sale is sourced to that business location.

  b.  When the product is not received by the purchaser at a business location of the seller, the sale is sourced to the location where receipt by the purchaser or the purchaser’s donee, designated as such by the purchaser, occurs, including the location indicated by instructions for delivery to the purchaser or donee, known to the seller.

  c.  When paragraphs “a” and “b” do not apply, the sale is sourced to the location indicated by an address for the purchaser that is available from the business records of the seller that are maintained in the ordinary course of the seller’s business when use of this address does not constitute bad faith.

  d.  When paragraphs “a”, “b”, and “c” do not apply, the sale is sourced to the location indicated by an address for the purchaser obtained during the consummation of the sale, including the address of a purchaser’s payment instrument, if no other address is available, when use of this address does not constitute bad faith.

  e.  When paragraphs “a”, “b”, “c”, and “d” do not apply, including the circumstance where the seller is without sufficient information to apply the previous rules, then the location will be determined by the address from which tangible personal property was shipped, from which the digital good or the computer software delivered electronically was first available for transmission by the seller, or from which the service was provided disregarding for these purposes any location that merely provided the digital transfer of the product sold.

  2.  The lease or rental of tangible personal property, other than property identified in subsection 3 or section 423.16, shall be sourced as follows:

  a.  For a lease or rental that requires recurring periodic payments, the first periodic payment is sourced the same as a retail sale in accordance with the provisions of subsection 1. Periodic payments made subsequent to the first payment are sourced to the primary property location for each period covered by the payment. The primary property location shall be as indicated by an address for the property provided by the lessee that is available to the lessor from its records maintained in the ordinary course of business, when use of this address does not constitute bad faith. The property location shall not be altered by intermittent use at different locations, such as use of business property that accompanies employees on business trips and service calls.

  b.  For a lease or rental that does not require recurring periodic payments, the payment is sourced the same as a retail sale in accordance with the provisions of subsection 1.

  c.  This subsection does not affect the imposition or computation of sales or use tax on leases or rentals based on a lump sum or accelerated basis, or on the acquisition of property for lease.

  3.  The retail sale, including lease or rental, of transportation equipment shall be sourced the same as a retail sale in accordance with the provisions of subsection 1, notwithstanding the exclusion of lease or rental in that subsection. “Transportation equipment” means any of the following:

  a.  Locomotives or railcars that are utilized for the carriage of persons or property in interstate commerce.

  b.  Trucks and truck-tractors with a gross vehicle weight rating of ten thousand one pounds or greater, trailers, semitrailers, or passenger buses that meet both of the following requirements:

  (1)  Are registered through the international registration plan.

  (2)  Are operated under authority of a carrier authorized and certificated by the United States department of transportation or another federal authority to engage in the carriage of persons or property in interstate commerce.

  c.  Aircraft that are operated by air carriers authorized and certificated by the United States department of transportation or another federal or a foreign authority to engage in the carriage of persons or property in interstate or foreign commerce.

  d.  Containers designed for use on and component parts attached or secured on the items set forth in paragraphs “a” through “c”.

2003 Acts, 1st Ex, ch 2, §108, 205

; 2005 Acts, ch 140, §12

; 2011 Acts, ch 92, §8