Finance

All accommodations within the County subject to sales tax imposed by the State under G.S. 105-164.4(a)(3) are subject to Occupancy Tax of six percent (6%) of the gross receipts derived from the rental of accommodations. This occupancy tax is in addition to state and local sales tax, and is based on gross room sales.

You can contact the NC Department of Revenue at 1-877-252-3052 or www.dornc.com.

Fill out the New Remitter Form and send to the Finance Department as indicated on the form.

Occupancy Tax remittance and forms must be delivered in person or postmarked on or before the 20th of every month for the previous month of sales. For example, Occupancy Tax for the month of July (1st-31st) is due on or before August 20th. If the 20th falls on a weekend, the due date will be the following Monday.

• Room rental
• Credit card fees
• Damage fees
• Early/late departure fees
• Extra person charge
• In-room safe rentals
• Inspection fees
• Linen fees
• Maid/cleaning fees
• “Peace of mind” fees
• Pet fees
• Reservation/handling/processing/ administrative fees
• Security deposits
• Smoking fees
• Transfer fees
• Tentative reservation fees
• Charges for cribs and roll-away beds
• Charges for microwave ovens and refrigerators

Currently payments are accepted in the form of online pay and cash, check or money order physically delivered or mailed to the Buncombe County Finance Department.

The property owner is responsible for ensuring that Occupancy Tax is collected and remitted to Buncombe County for all applicable sales and fees. Some online services will collect the Occupancy Tax at the time of the reservation. Some of the online services will also remit the tax on the owner’s behalf, while some choose to send the tax collected to the owner for remittance. It will be the responsibility of the property owner to communicate with the online service and be clear on the extent of their involvement.

If a third party is collecting AND remitting Occupancy Tax for sales at your establishment, you will not need to remit any tax for those particular sales. There is a place on the monthly remittance form to subtract these sales before calculating the tax due.

Please note, in the event of an audit, the property owner would be required to produce documentation showing that a third party had remitted Occupancy Tax for any sales that the owner did not pay tax on.

An accommodation rented to the same person for a period of 90 or more continuous days is not subject to Occupancy Tax. The tax collected from any person prior to the accumulation of such 90 continuous days of occupancy by said person shall be refunded to such person by the establishment. An establishment making any such refund of tax which has been paid to the County shall be entitled to claim a credit for the tax so refunded on the return due to the County for the month in which the refund occurred.

North Carolina has an exemption for Centrally Billed Account (CBA) travel cards and purchase cards.  Federal government employees using a CBA card are exempt from state sales tax as well as Buncombe County occupancy tax.  More information on the state tax exemption and how to recognize the cards that the exemption applies to can be found at the GSA website as well as in Section 37 of the NC Department of Revenue Sales and Use Tax Bulletin.