Reducing Tax Liability to Protect Profits in a Downturn

This Merit Advisors client is a large, publicly traded oilfield service company.

Challenge:

• The company engaged Merit to undertake a holistic review of their state and local tax payments to identify all possible cash tax savings.
• Given their share price at the time, the company felt its total taxable valuations and liabilities exceeded reasonable levels.
• The company needed to identify ways to maintain a level of profitability amid diminishing market activity across the industry.

Merit Solution:

• Merit negotiated directly with taxing jurisdictions to reduce both the company’s property tax and sales and use tax liabilities.
• Our sales and use tax team resolved outstanding sales tax audit issues for the company.

Result:

After achieving substantial savings in the first year alone, Merit developed a plan to maintain those gains going forward—and project accruals for more accurate planning and budgeting.

$18M

one-year cash tax savings