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the limitations periods under section 6501, including those
extended by agreement pursuant to section 6501(c)(4), stating (at
283):
any extension agreement which gives rise to a
prohibition against assessment is subject to Section
6503(a). Whenever the taxpayer and the IRS extend the
limitations period for assessment to a point in time
triggered by the sending of a notice of deficiency, the
Government has the benefit of the suspension contained
in Section 6503(a), and if a notice of deficiency is in
fact sent, thereby triggering a period of prohibition
against assessment, the taxpayer cannot rely on any
contrary clause in the extension agreement to
eviscerate Section 6503(a)'s protection. Moreover, if
the taxpayer files for a redetermination of deficiency
in the Tax Court, the second parenthetical provision of
Section 6503(a) operates to further suspend the
limitations period until 60 days after the decision of
the Tax Court becomes final. * * * [Emphasis added.]
The same result had been reached in an alternative holding
in Ramirez v. United States, 210 Ct. Cl. 537, 538 F.2d 888, 893
(1976), where the Court stated:
Since the agreement entered into between the parties
was clearly done under authority of section 6501(c)(4),
the extended contractual period of limitation was as
much a "period of limitations provided for in section
6501" as was the otherwise controlling general 3-year
period provided for in section 6501(a). Consequently,
upon the mailing of the notice of deficiency by the
government, section 6503(a)(1), on its own suspended
the extended contractual period of limitation for the
same 150 days and, without the aid of the automatic
extension proviso in the agreement, the assessment
would have been timely in any case. [Fn. ref.
omitted.]
We agree with the analysis in Ramirez and Lansburgh and
reach the same result here. Although the consent agreement would
apparently on its face result in the expiration of the assessment
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