Menu
Tax Notes logo

The Tide Keeps Going Out, Carrying Overpayment Interest Suits Away from District Courts

Posted on July 6, 2020

We welcome back regular guest blogger Bob Probasco. Bob is the director of the Low Income tax Clinic at Texas A&M University School of Law. Prior to starting the clinic at Texas A&M, Bob had a long a varied career in different tax positions. Before law school, he spent more than twenty years in various accounting and business positions, including with one of the “Big Four” CPA firms and Mobil Oil Corporation. After law school and a year clerking with Judge Lindsay of the Northern District of Texas, he practiced tax law with the Dallas office of Thompson & Knight. He left T&K in 2014 and started a solo practice before switching to full time academia. Keith

We return to the jurisdictional dispute over taxpayer stand-alone suits claiming additional overpayment interest in excess of $10,000. The latest development, a decision on July 2nd by the Federal Circuit in Bank of America v. United States, docket number 19-2357, continues a trend that I’ve been following for two years now. Until recently, the only decision on this issue at the Circuit Court level was E.W. Scripps Co. v. United States, 420 F.3d 589 (6th Cir. 2005), which concluded that district courts can hear such claims. For years, most lower courts followed the Sixth Circuit. But recently the tide turned. Here’s a timeline of recent cases illustrating the change.

First, the lower courts follow Scripps and agree that district courts have jurisdiction over these claims:

  • October 31, 2016:  The Southern District of New York follows Scripps in Pfizer, Inc. v. United States, 118 A.F.T.R.2d (RIA) 2016-6405 (S.D.N.Y. 2016) and decides it has subject matter jurisdiction.  On May 12, 2017, the court dismissed the case for lack of jurisdiction for failure to timely file the refund suit.  Prior discussion here.  The taxpayer appeals.
  • July 1, 2019:  The Western District of North Carolina follows Scripps in Bank of America Corp. v. United States, 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 109238, 2019 WL 2745856 (W.D.N.C. 2019), and denies the motion to transfer the case to the Court of Federal Claims.  Prior discussion here.  The government appeals.
  • August 30, 2019:  In the Southern District of Florida, the magistrate judge’s report and recommendation in Paresky v. United States, 2019 U.S. Dist. Lexis 149629, 2019 WL 4888689 (S.D. Fla. 2019) follows Scripps.  The magistrate judge concludes that the court has subject matter jurisdiction but recommends dismissal in part for failure to file timely refund claims. Prior discussion here.

And then a break, with cases now holding that only the Court of Federal Claims, not district courts, have jurisdiction over these claims:

  • September 16, 2019: The Second Circuit reverses the S.D.N.Y., in Pfizer, Inc. v. United States, 939 F.3d 173 (2d Cir. 2019) and concludes there is no subject matter jurisdiction.  Prior discussion here.  The court transfers the case to the Court of Federal Claims, docket number 19-1803. Plaintiff files a motion for summary judgment on April 30, 2020.
  • October 7, 2019:  The District of Colorado agrees with Pfizer, in Estate of Culver v. United States, 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 173235, 2019 WL 4930225 (D. Colo. 2019).  The court transfers the case to the Court of Federal Claims, docket number 19-1941.
  • October 21, 2019:  In the Southern District of Florida, the district court judge in Paresky v. United States declines to adopt the magistrate judge’s report and recommendation and follows Pfizer, dismissing the case for lack of subject matter jurisdiction.  Prior discussion here.  The taxpayers appeal.
  • July 2, 2020:  The Federal Circuit agrees with Pfizer and reverses the WDNC, in Bank of America Corp. v. United States. It remands the case to the WDNC, to sever some of the claims and transfer them to the Court of Federal Claims.

So now we have the Sixth Circuit holding that district courts have jurisdiction over such suits while the Second and Federal Circuits disagree, with one more circuit court considering the issue. Mr. and Mrs. Paresky’s case is currently pending in the Eleventh Circuit, docket number 19-14589. Appellants filed their primary brief on May 27, 2020. The government’s brief is due on July 27, 2020.

When only one circuit court has ruled on a difficult issue, district courts – even in other circuits – tend to follow that decision. But once another circuit court disagrees, the better analysis tends to win out and lower courts change direction. It’s possible that the magistrate judge in Paresky, and the district court in Bank of America, would have reached a different conclusion if they were deciding after Pfizer. My guess is that the Eleventh Circuit will agree with the Second and Federal Circuits on this issue. This is still a small sample size, but I suspect the tide has turned decisively.

Caveat:  Bank of America lost in the Federal Circuit but has a strong incentive (see below) to seek review by the Supreme Court.  Similarly, the government may want a ruling by the Supreme Court to overturn Scripps once and for all.  With a circuit split, and if both parties ask the Supreme Court to hear the case – well, the Court hates tax cases but might take this one.  If so, all bets are off.

How did we get here?

Before I get into the court’s decision, a brief reminder why Bank of America, appealed from the Western District of North Carolina, wound up in the Federal Circuit instead of the Fourth Circuit. The government had moved to dismiss the case, or in the alternative to transfer it to the Court of Federal Claims, on the basis that the district court did not have jurisdiction for such cases. The district court denied both alternatives, as the court concluded it had jurisdiction. However, if a district court issues an interlocutory order “granting or denying, in whole or in part, a motion to transfer an action to the United States Court of Federal Claims,” a party can make an interlocutory appeal and the Federal Circuit has exclusive jurisdiction. 28 U.S.C. § 1292(d)(4). The government could have done the same in Pfizer, when the district court ruled against it on the first motion to dismiss for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, but it chose not to do so. In the second motion to dismiss, based on failure to timely file the refund suit, the government did not request transfer, so Pfizer’s appeal was to the Second Circuit.

Statutory interpretation

The jurisdictional provision at issue in these cases is 28 U.S.C. § 1346(a)(1). It has no dollar limitation. That’s the statute we rely on when filing tax refund suits, so I think of it as “tax refund jurisdiction.”  The taxpayers in these cases argued that it also covers stand-alone suits for overpayment interest, although technically those are not refund suits. The alternative jurisdictional provision for district courts, the “little Tucker Act” at § 1346(a)(2), provides jurisdiction for any claim against the United States “founded either upon the Constitution, or any Act of Congress, or any regulation of an executive department . . . .” but is limited to claims of $10,000 or less.  The comparable jurisdictional statute for the Court of Federal Claims, § 1491(a)(1), has no such limitation. So, if § 1346(a)(1) covers stand-alone suits for overpayment interest, taxpayers can bring suit in either district court or the CFC. If it doesn’t, and the claim exceeds $10,000, the only option is the CFC.

Here’s what § 1346(a)(1) says, with the relevant language italicized:

Any civil action against the United States for the recovery of any internal-revenue tax alleged to have been erroneously or illegally assessed or collected, or any penalty claimed to have been collected without authority or any sum alleged to have been excessive or in any manner wrongfully collected under the internal-revenue laws

The language is very similar to Section 7422(a), which sets forth requirements for tax refund suits. Because those requirements – exhaustion of administrative remedies and a shorter statute of limitations than for the little Tucker Act – have frequently been held not applicable to these stand-alone overpayment interest suits, the government argues that § 1346(a)(1) doesn’t apply to such suits either.

Overpayment interest doesn’t fall within the first two categories because it is neither tax nor penalty. But Scripps interpreted the third category, “any sum alleged to have been excessive,” as broad enough to cover overpayment interest suits. After all, the Supreme Court had stated in Flora v. United States, 362 U.S. 145, 149 (1960): “One obvious example of such a ‘sum’ is interest.” Scripps concluded that the amount was “excessive” if you looked at how much the government retained rather than collected and, more importantly, focused on the entire balance of the account rather just individual components such as the overpayment interest. (I provided an illustration of this last point here.) The comparison to section 7422(a) was inapt because section 7422(a) includes a qualifying header (“No suit prior to filing claim for refund”); § 1346(a)(1) does not and therefore could include both refund suits and “non-refund” suits.

Both the Second Circuit and the Federal Circuit disagreed completely with that analysis. The comment in Flora, in context, referred to underpayment interest (which is assessed and collected) rather than overpayment interest (which is paid out). The structure of § 1346(a)(1), including the first two categories in the list, and the use of the present-perfect tense “have been” made it clear that it referred to amounts that had been previously paid to, or collected by, the IRS. And the statutory language mattered much more than the header for section 7422(a) versus lack of such for § 1346(a)(1).

Legislative history

Both parties in Bank of America also pointed the court to legislative history in support of their positions. In its opening brief, the government pointed out that the final version of the provision was understood by courts to establish a narrow exception to the $10,000 limitation for “little Tucker Act” claims – only for tax refund claims. The government also focused on the Supreme Court’s discussions of the legislative history in Flora v. United States, 357 U.S. 63 (1958), and Flora v. United States, 362 U.S. 145 (1960).

Here is a summary of the arguments in the taxpayer’s brief:

  • The predecessor statutes to § 1346(a)(1) were designed to eliminate several distinctions and inequities. For example, the earlier provisions (a) for district court jurisdiction, requiring suing the Collector and could not brought after he died; and (b) for Court of Claims jurisdiction, did not allow for awarding interest. Thus, in some instances, a taxpayer would have no way to recover overpayment interest. In a floor statement introducing an amendment to the Revenue Act of 1921, a Senator noted those issues and stated that the amendment was intended to eliminate the problems.
  • The Assistant Chief Counsel of the Bureau of Internal Revenue represented, in a 1953 Senate subcommittee hearing, his opinion that the language of § 1346(a)(1) already covered stand-alone overpayment interest suits.
  • In connection with that same hearing, Treasury later provided by letter a list of several cases in district court involving stand-alone claims for interest.   

In its reply brief, the government took issue with the taxpayer’s arguments based on legislative history:

  • The Senator who introduced amendments to the Revenue Act of 1921 was concerned about tax refund claims, on which overpayment interest might be paid, rather than stand-alone claims for overpayment interest.
  • It was not entirely clear that the Assistant Chief Counsel’s statement at the 1953 Senate subcommittee hearing concerned stand-alone claims for overpayment interest. In any event, a witness from the ABA testifying at the same hearing disagreed with the Assistant Chief Counsel’s opinion that the existing statute covered stand-alone claims.
  • None of the 14 cases listed on the letter from Treasury of district court litigation concerned jurisdiction under § 1346(a)(1) for stand-alone claims of overpayment interest, the issue in Bank of America. Only six cases involved overpayment interest at all, of which: (a) two declined to exercise jurisdiction; (b) two didn’t question jurisdiction; and (c) two were based on different jurisdictional provisions and involved claims under $10,000.

This brief summary doesn’t do the arguments justice, of course. For those interested in more details, I suggest a review of the parties’ briefs, which provide a detailed history of the evolution of the jurisdictional provisions. I was impressed by the thoroughness of both sides’ work, scratching and clawing for anything they could find or infer in support of their respective positions. They did the best possible with what little was out there.

I count myself among those who consider legislative history relevant in interpreting ambiguous statutes, and a good tax lawyer (or judge) can find ambiguity in almost anything if they want to. Even so, I considered these examples unlikely to persuade a court that had not already decided for other reasons. I went back and looked at some of the original sources when reading the district court decision and they didn’t persuade me in either direction. The Federal Circuit didn’t seem impressed either.

Impact on Bank of America

When I originally looked at the case, I thought that “most” of Bank of America’s claim would be eliminated if it lost in the Federal Circuit. The third amended complaint was for $163 million, of which $141 million related to interest netting. The interest netting claims seemed particularly vulnerable if Bank of America had to litigate in the CFC (see below), based on a cursory review of the complaint. Now that I’ve reviewed the motion to dismiss more carefully, it appears that “most” overstated the potential impact on Bank of America, although it’s still significant.

The benefits of interest netting – the section 6621(d) adjustments to eliminate the interest rate differential – can be effected two ways.  The government can pay additional overpayment interest to bring that rate up to the underpayment interest rate, or it can refund underpayment interest to bring that rate down to the overpayment interest rate. 

Over $95 million of the benefit from interest netting came from years in which the adjustments were for reductions/refund of underpayment interest. A claim for refund of excessive underpayment interest clearly fits with § 1346(a)(1); under section 6601(e)(1), underpayment interest is treated as tax, except that it is not subject to deficiency procedures.

Thus, there would be no basis for transferring those claims to the CFC.  (There were small amounts of overpayment interest in those years, presumably interest on the claimed refund of underpayment interest rather than directly from interest netting.  That overpayment interest would not be a disallowed stand-alone claim for overpayment interest; it would be permitted under ancillary jurisdiction.)  The government sought to transfer only $67 million of the total complaint amount to the CFC, of which only $44 million involved interest netting.  Assuming that the non-interest netting claims are not at a particular disadvantage in the CFC, Bank of America’s loss from the Federal Circuit’s decision may be only $44 million, or even less.  Well, to the taxpayer losing the claim, “only” is an inappropriate adverb; that’s still a lot of money.

Interest netting

Most taxpayers are perfectly willing to litigate interest cases in the CFC.  The CFC judges tend to have more experience with interest issues and most large interest cases are litigated there instead of district courts. In fact, Bank of America has another interest netting case pending there now. Taxpayers tend to bring substantial stand-alone interest cases in district court only to: (a) take advantage of favorable precedent in that circuit; or (b) avoid unfavorable precedent in the Federal Circuit.  Pfizer was an example of the former.  It wanted to rely on a favorable precedent, Doolin v. United States, 918 F.2d 15 (2d Cir. 1990).  It won’t necessarily lose its case elsewhere; it might persuade the CFC to reach the same decision as the Second Circuit did in Doolin.  Based on the complaint, I suspect Bank of America is an example of the latter, in this case trying to avoid an unfavorable precedent regarding interest netting, Wells Fargo & Co. v. United States, 827 F.3d 1026 (Fed. Cir. 2016).  (Prior discussion here.)

Wells Fargo involved interest netting claims between separate corporations that had merged.  The Federal Circuit decided that, in such contexts, interest netting is only permitted if the period of overlap (an underpayment balance for one period and an overpayment balance for another period) began after the date of the merger. Here’s an illustration:

Company A had a $2.5 million underpayment balance for its 2008 tax year outstanding from 3/15/2009.  Company B had a $2 million overpayment balance for its 2011 tax year outstanding from 3/15/2012.  If the balances were still outstanding until paid/refunded on 12/1/2016, there was a $2 million overlap from 3/15/2012 (when the second balance began) until 12/1/2016 (when both balances ended).  During that overlap period, there was an interest rate differential; corporations earned from 1% to 4.5% less on overpayments than they paid on underpayments, and in this scenario the difference would more likely be 4.5% than 1%.

If the companies merged in 2010, $2 million of the respective balances could be netted to avoid that differential, for the entire period from 3/15/2012 to 12/1/2016.  But if the companies merged in 2013, under Wells Fargo those balances could not be netted at all. I think a better interpretation of the law would allow interest netting for part of the overlap period, starting from the date of the merger. But the CFC will rule based on Wells Fargo, not based on my interpretation.

As noted above, Bank of America’s claims that will now wind up in the CFC include $44 million of interest netting benefits.  I don’t know if the entire $44 million will be denied based on Wells Fargo.  But (a) those claims involve Merrill Lynch’s tax years 1987, 1990, 1991, 1999, 2002, 2003, 2005, 2006, and 2007 tax years; and (b) Merrill Lynch merged with Bank of America on October 1, 2013.  I didn’t try to review the interest computations attached to the motion to dismiss, but I anticipate Bank of America stands to lose the vast majority of the $44 million.  Worth a cert petition to the Supreme Court?

Impact elsewhere?

The above discussion concerns how this case impacts Bank of America and more broadly other companies that might prefer to bring stand-alone overpayment interest suits in district court.  That doesn’t mean the impact of this line of cases is limited to overpayment interest.  Pfizer and Bank of America identified a certain type of claim that arises under the Internal Revenue Code but is not a tax refund claim for purposes of jurisdiction.  This distinction might affect not only the available forum, which is what I’ve been focusing on here, but also other issues. For example, a “non-refund claim” under the little Tucker Act will not be subject to the requirement to exhaust administrative remedies and will have a different statute of limitation.

Are there other examples of “non-refund claims” arising under the Code?There may well be, and Carl Smith pointed out one prominent recent example that cited Pfizer. On June 19, 2020, the district court of Maryland decided in R.V. v. Mnuchin, 2020 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 107420 (D. Md. 2020), that the government had waived its sovereign immunity with respect to the CARES Act economic impact payments (EIPs).  The plaintiffs claimed jurisdiction under, among others, the little Tucker Act, § 1346(a)(2).  That jurisdiction requires a separate “money-mandating” statute, for which the plaintiffs pointed to section 6428.  The government argued that section 6428 is a tax statute; any challenge to the denial of a credit falls within the jurisdiction of § 1346(a)(1) instead of § 1346(a)(2) and is subject to the restrictions of section 7422.  The plaintiffs’ failure to exhaust administrative remedies was fatal to their claim.

The court dismissed the government’s motion to dismiss without prejudice.  It stated: “The Government argues that 26 U.S.C. § 6428 is not a money-mandating statute because it is a tax statute.  True.  But the two are not mutually exclusive.”  It cited Pfizer for that proposition.  To put it another way, a tax statute authorizes refund claims, but it also may authorize claims that are not “tax refund claims” for purposes of § 1346(a)(1) and not subject to section 7422 but are money-mandating provisions sufficient to support a Tucker Act claim.

The Advance Premium Tax Credit under the Affordable Care Act would likely be another “non-refund claim.” As with the EIPs, it is reconciled on the taxpayer’s tax return, but it is paid in advance pursuant to a clear money-mandating statute. Michelle Drumbl points out that the U.S. at one time had an advance earned income credit and other countries currently have similar advance credits. If Congress ever enacted her proposal for a transition to periodic payments rather than when the tax return is filed, that would likely also qualify as a “non-refund claim.”

What about refundable credits that are not paid in advance? That might be a harder argument to make; it’s not clear whether there is a money-mandating provision other than section 6402(a), working with section 6401(b)(1). But “hard” doesn’t always mean “impossible.” I haven’t researched enough to know whether a taxpayer has ever tried filing suit for payment of refundable credits based on the little Tucker Act instead of § 1346(a)(1). It might be the only route for recovery for a taxpayer who filed a return claiming a refund (based on a refundable credit) more than three years after the due date. The six-year statute of limitations for a little Tucker Act suit might avoid the problem of the “look back” limitation of section 6511(b)(2). It might be worth a try if you have a client with the right facts.

After all, ten months ago we weren’t sure the government would convince a court that stand-alone overpayment interest suits are “non-refund claims” for which district court jurisdiction is only available under the little Tucker Act. Now, the government has won in the Second and Federal Circuits and seems to have momentum heading into the Eleventh Circuit.

Postscript

While I was working on this post, Jack Townsend posted on his blog concerning the Federal Circuit’s decision in Bank of America. Jack’s observations are always worth reading.

DOCUMENT ATTRIBUTES
Subject Areas / Tax Topics
Authors
Copy RID