Heavy equipment dealers: the licensing rule
Heavy Equipment Dealers and Wholesalers, New and Used. Written from the agency's own pages.
A business that sells tangible personal property in Texas must hold a Texas sales and use tax permit 1. A dealer needs a permit for each active place of business, meaning an outlet, office or location that receives three or more orders for taxable items in a calendar year 1. A warehouse, storage yard or manufacturing plant is not a place of business unless the seller receives three or more orders there in a calendar year 1.
When a dealer sells to a business that will resell the item, it can accept a properly completed Form 01-339 resale certificate instead of collecting sales tax 2. A customer's permit number, or a copy of the permit, is not a substitute for a resale certificate 2. The seller keeps the certificate for four years and should not accept it if it has reason to believe the property is bought for other than resale 2.
Selling off-road diesel equipment of 50 horsepower or more, such as excavators, cranes and graders, also means collecting a surcharge on top of sales tax 3. The permit application asks for tax identity details such as Social Security or federal employer numbers and a NAICS code, and it does not list a skill test, insurance or contractor bonding 5. The Comptroller's Taxpayer Search shows whether a permit is active or inactive 4.
The Comptroller's list of active permit holders shows a NAICS industry code for each outlet 6.
Not found in the pages read
- A Comptroller statement that the NAICS code on the active-permit list is self-reported or checked was not found in the pages read; the application page lists a NAICS code among the items an applicant needs.
- A Comptroller statement in words that the sales tax permit is not a contractor license was not found; the guide reports only what the permit pages list.
- Tax Code Chapter 151 and Texas Administrative Code text (resale rules) were not read: the statute and rule sites build their pages with JavaScript and returned an empty shell. The resale points rest on the Comptroller's FAQ page.
- Any Comptroller page specific to wholesalers of construction and mining machinery (NAICS 423810) was not found; the resale and permit FAQ pages apply to sellers generally.
- Dealer licensing by other agencies (for example the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles for titled vehicles) was not researched in this round.
A guide is a summary for orientation. It is not legal advice, and the agency's pages and statutes control.