Chicago now collecting e911 tax on prepaid cards.

[hiwatt]

Today in my travels I remembered that I needed to top up. Stopped by Walgreen's to see if they had a $35 card and noticed a sign above the prepaid rack: "$3.50 e911 tax will now be added to all prepaid cell cards effective Jan 12, 2012." I thought it was odd that I never heard of that before, noticed no $35 card and left. Walked down the street to 7-11 and they in fact had the correct card and the tax was $1.93. The cashier told me that the tax is supposed to be based on what you pay (which makes sense, but then few tax laws make sense in Chicago) and that Walgreen's is incorrect in charging everyone $3.50. At any rate; are any of you now paying this tax, and if so where?

 

[Petrah]

Knock on wood, it has not been added here.

 

[hiwatt]

Knock on wood, it has not been added here.

Yeah, good call (not the Walmart part though, those people can cram it) there's no tax online. I of course only figured that out after walking around in the cold like an idiot Another thing I found somewhat odd: The 7-11 guy asked me how much I'd like to refill and rang it up as a IL lottery ticket. Then he voided it and rerang it some other way and told me I was all set. I asked if there was a pin number on the receipt and he was confused. The owner overheard that and gave me the receipt and told me if I had any problems to come back and he'd help. Luckily there were no issues. Also, I got a delicious iced coffee

 

[amk2795]

Will this effect the outlying suburbs of Chicago, or just the city? Cook County has the stupidest taxes, but my town's are a little lower than the I-think-11-something-percent in the city.

 

[hiwatt]

Will this effect the outlying suburbs of Chicago, or just the city? Cook County has the stupidest taxes, but my town's are a little lower than the I-think-11-something-percent in the city.

The city's sales tax is 9.5%. The taxes are high, but I like the streets plowed and the garbage removed