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DOR > En Español  > Tax Billing and Collection Process Tax Billing and Collection Process

June 23, 2009

If you have a business in Indiana, you have bills. If the Indiana Department of Revenue is one of those bills, don’t panic. Contact the Indiana Department of Revenue, and someone will be glad to work with you to help you solve your problem.

To better understand what happens if you get a bill from the Indiana Department of Revenue, let’s walk through the tax collection process.

  1. If the Indiana Department of Revenue finds that you have an unpaid tax due, a bill is issued. You have 45 days to either pay the bill or lodge a protest if you don’t think it is correct. The important thing is for you to contact the Department within that 45-day window. If you do not, you have lost your opportunity to protest the bill.
  1. If you don’t take any action, an updated bill is issued and you are given 10 days to pay the amount due. You really need to pay the bill by this stage because additional penalties apply if the bill goes to the next stage, which is a warrant for the collection of tax due.

If you are contacting the Indiana Department of Revenue because you do not have the funds to pay the bill, the Department can work with you. If your business owes more than $500, you might be eligible for a payment plan.

At this point the two most important things to know are that the bill won’t go away and Indiana Department of Revenue can’t help with a payment plan once the bill becomes a tax warrant.

  1. When a tax warrant is issued, a lien is placed on the business property (liens may also be placed on the assets of the company’s responsible officers) and will go on your credit report. Though the sheriff collects the money owed on the tax warrant, it is not for your arrest. The warrant is for the bill that is due. The sheriff chooses the method of collection, which can include selling the business’s (or your) property at an auction, garnishing your wages or levying your bank account.

The longer the collection process goes on, the more serious the consequences such as penalties and interest being added to your tax bill, or your tax bill being sent to a professional collection agency.

Businesses are the heart of Indiana’s economy. The Indiana Department of Revenue wants to work with businesses so they can be in good standing and keep the economy growing.

If you would like to speak with a bilingual representative from the Department of Revenue about business tax, please call (317) 232-2240 (press 2 for Spanish) from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., Monday through Friday. You can submit questions via e-mail to jevans@dor.in.gov You may also visit our new Web site www.impuestos.in.gov/

If you have any suggestions for this blog, please e-mail those suggestions to Señora Hinojosa at feedback@dor.in.gov

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