N.Y. Tax Law § 470: Definitions

§ 470. Definitions. When used in this article the following words

shall have the meanings herein indicated: 1. "Cigarette." Any roll for

smoking made wholly or in part of tobacco or of any other substance,

irrespective of size or shape and whether or not such tobacco or

substance is flavored, adulterated or mixed with any other ingredient,

the wrapper or cover of which is made of paper or any other substance or

material but is not made in whole or in part of tobacco. "Cigarette"

shall not include a research tobacco product.

2. "Tobacco products." Any cigar, including a little cigar, tobacco,

or alternative nicotine product, other than cigarettes, intended for

consumption by smoking, chewing, or as snuff. "Tobacco products" shall

not include research tobacco products.

2-a. "Roll-your-own tobacco." Any tobacco product that, because of its

appearance, type, packaging or labeling, is suitable for use and likely

to be offered to, or purchased by, consumers as tobacco for making

cigarettes.

2-b. "Little cigar." Any roll for smoking made wholly or in part of

tobacco if such product is wrapped in any substance containing tobacco,

other than natural leaf tobacco wrapper, and weighing not more than four

pounds per thousand or with a cellulose acetate or other integrated

filter.

3. "Person" includes an individual, copartnership, limited liability

company, society, association, corporation, joint stock company, and any

combination of individuals and also an executor, administrator,

receiver, trustee or other fiduciary.

4. "Sale" means any transfer of title or possession or both, exchange

or barter, conditional or otherwise, in any manner or by any means

whatever or any agreement therefor.

5. "Retail sale" or "sale at retail" means a sale to a consumer or to

any other person for any purpose other than resale.

6. "Wholesale price." The price for which a manufacturer or other

person sells tobacco products to a distributor, including the federal

excise taxes paid by the manufacturer or other person, before the

allowance of any discount, trade allowance, rebate or other reduction.

The invoice received by a distributor with respect to its purchase of

a tobacco product shall be presumptive evidence of the wholesale price

of such tobacco product.

7. "Dealer." Any wholesale dealer and retail dealer as hereinafter

defined.

8. "Wholesale dealer." Any person who (a) sells cigarettes or tobacco

products to retail dealers or other persons for purposes of resale, or

(b) owns, operates or maintains one or more cigarette or tobacco product

vending machines in, at or upon premises owned or occupied by any other

person, or (c) sells cigarettes or tobacco products to an Indian nation

or tribe or to a reservation cigarette seller on a qualified

reservation.

9. "Retail dealer." Any person other than a wholesale dealer engaged

in selling cigarettes or tobacco products. For purposes of section four

hundred eighty-a of this article and section eleven hundred thirty-four

of this chapter, such term shall include for each such person engaged in

selling cigarettes or tobacco products all "persons required to collect

tax," as defined in subdivision one of section eleven hundred thirty-one

of this chapter.

10. "Package." The individual package, box or other container in or

from which retail sales of cigarettes are normally made or intended to

be made.

11. "Agent." Any person licensed by the commissioner of taxation and

finance to purchase and affix adhesive or meter stamps on packages of

cigarettes under this article.

12. "Distributor." Any person who imports or causes to be imported

into this state any tobacco product (in excess of fifty cigars, one

pound of tobacco, or fifteen units of alternative nicotine products) for

sale, or who manufactures any tobacco product in this state, and any

person within or without the state who is authorized by the commissioner

of taxation and finance to make returns and pay the tax on tobacco

products sold, shipped or delivered by them to any person in the state.

13. "Unstamped or unlawfully stamped packages of cigarettes." A

package of cigarettes which bears no tax stamp, or which bears a tax

stamp of another state or taxing jurisdiction is considered to be an

unstamped package of cigarettes. A package of cigarettes bearing a

counterfeit New York state or a counterfeit joint state and New York

city tax stamp is an unlawfully stamped package of cigarettes.

14. "Indian nation or tribe." One of the following New York state

Indian nations or tribes: Cayuga Nation, Oneida Nation of New York,

Onondaga Nation, Poospatuck or Unkechauge Nation, Saint Regis Mohawk

Tribe, Seneca Nation of Indians, Shinnecock Indian Nation, Tonawanda

Band of Seneca and Tuscarora Nation.

15. "Qualified Indian." A person duly enrolled on the tribal rolls of

one of the Indian nations or tribes. In the case of the Cayuga Indian

Nation of New York, such term shall include enrolled members of such

nation when such enrolled members purchase cigarettes on any Seneca

reservation.

16. "Qualified reservation." (a) Lands held by an Indian nation or

tribe that is located within the reservation of that nation or tribe in

the state;

(b) Lands within the state over which an Indian nation or tribe

exercises governmental power and that are either (i) held by the Indian

nation or tribe subject to restrictions by the United States against

alienation, or (ii) held in trust by the United States for the benefit

of such Indian nation or tribe;

(c) Lands held by the Shinnecock Tribe or the Poospatuck (Unkechauge)

Nation within their respective reservations; or

(d) Any land that falls within paragraph (a) or (b) of this

subdivision, and which may be sold and replaced with other land in

accordance with an Indian nation's or tribe's land claims settlement

agreement with the state of New York, shall nevertheless be deemed to be

subject to restriction by the United States against alienation.

17. "Reservation cigarette seller." A seller of cigarettes which is an

Indian nation or tribe, one or more members of such tribe, or an entity

wholly owned by either or both, which sells cigarettes within the

boundaries of a qualified reservation.

18. "Snuff." Any finely cut, ground, or powdered tobacco that is not

intended to be smoked.

19. "Cigar." Any roll of tobacco wrapped in leaf tobacco or in any

substance containing tobacco (other than any roll of tobacco that is a

cigarette as defined in subdivision one of this section). "Cigar" shall

include, except where expressly excluded, any little cigar.

20. "Research tobacco product." A tobacco product or cigarette that is

labeled as a research tobacco product, manufactured for use in research

for health, scientific, or similar experimental purposes, is exclusively

used for such purposes by an accredited college, university or hospital,

or a researcher affiliated with an accredited college, university or

hospital, and is not offered for sale or sold to consumers for any

purpose.

21. "Affiliated person." Persons are affiliated persons with respect

to each other where one of such persons has an ownership interest of

more than five percent, whether direct or indirect, in the other, or

where an ownership interest of more than five percent, whether direct or

indirect, is held in each of such persons by another person, or by a

group of other persons that are affiliated persons with respect to each

other.

22. "Alternative nicotine product." Any noncombustible product, other

than vapor products, which contains nicotine but not tobacco and is

intended for human consumption, whether chewed, absorbed, dissolved, or

ingested by any other means. "Alternative nicotine product" does not

include any product regulated as a drug or device by the U.S. Food and

Drug Administration (FDA) under Chapter V (21 U.S.C. § 351 et seq.) of

the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act. The term "unit" as it relates

to alternative nicotine products means any cannister, pack, box, carton,

or container of any kind or, if no other container, any wrapping, in

which an alternative nicotine product is offered for sale, sold, or

otherwise distributed to consumers.