Opinion
36588-21
01-11-2023
NOELLE BLIGHT MCAVOY, Petitioners v. COMMISSIONER OF INTERNAL REVENUE, Respondent
ORDER OF DISMISSAL FOR LACK OF JURISDICTION
Kathleen Kerrigan, Chief Judge
On February 23, 2022, respondent filed a Motion to Dismiss for Lack of Jurisdiction on the ground that the petition, filed December 7, 2021, was not timely filed in response to the notice of deficiency dated August 2, 2021. Petitioner filed an Objection on May 17, 2022, explaining that she
filed the petition in question on time and before the due date of November 1, 2021. The petition and documents were mailed in a standard envelope via the local United States Postal Service on or around October 24, 2021. Due to the Petitioner's lack of knowledge with the number of postage stamps necessary for the envelope to be mailed, and due to the fact the Petitioner mailed the envelope by going to a USPS issued mailbox, which the Petitioner has done many times before, rather than going in-person to the Post Office, the documents, the envelope and its contents were mailed back to the address it was sent from, citing the lack of necessary postage, which was unknown to the Petitioner.
Petitioner further explains that she remailed the petition to the Court after she discovered it had been returned to her.
I.R.C. section 7502(a) generally provides that timely mailing of a petition will be treated as timely filing of that petition, but only if, among other things, (1) the postmark date on the envelope in which such petition is mailed falls within the prescribed period for filing such petition and (2) the petition was deposited in the mail within that prescribed period, "sufficient postage prepaid". I.R.C. sec. 7502(a)(2); sec. 301.7502-1(c)(1)(ii), Proced. & Admin. Regs.
The Tax Court is a court of limited jurisdiction, and we may exercise that jurisdiction only to the extent authorized by Congress. Naftel v. Commissioner, 85 T.C. 527, 529 (1985). The Court has no authority to extend the deadline for filing a petition in response to a notice of deficiency, even if the petition is late due to inadvertent error. See Hallmark Research Collective v. Commissioner, No. 21284-21, 159 T.C. (Nov. 29, 2022). The petition arrived in an envelope bearing a U.S. Postal Service postmark of December 1, 2021--a date after the deadline for timely filing--and the fact that petitioner attempted to mail her petition on time but affixed insufficient postage does not change the result.
Upon due consideration and for cause, it is
ORDERED that respondent's motion is granted, and this case is dismissed for lack of jurisdiction.