States Crunch Data in Tax Hunt for Out-of-State Sellers

State revenue departments are turning toward data crunching in order to identify out-of-state companies that should be paying them sales tax.

The Indiana Department of Revenue is reaching out to 1,000 companies that appear to meet thresholds under state law to pay Indiana’s 7 percent sales tax. Those leads came from a contract with Verus Analytics LLC, which used credit card information and other proprietary data to identify 6,000 out-of-state companies that likely meet Indiana’s annual thresholds of at least 200 transactions and $100,000 in sales.

The Hoosier state is far from alone. Six other state revenue ...