I left CA in May 2020. At the time, I was working for a CA employer, who (during COVID) was fine with my working out of state (for personal reasons) and listed both my residence and place of employment as another state (which happens to not have a state income tax- but again, that was not my reason for moving). I did not pay CA state income taxes after May 2020, except for RSUs (stocks) that had been granted when I was in CA and actually vested when I was in the new state.
In September 2021, I left this company. In October 2021, I began at a new company- that is also headquartered in CA. I was told I could work remotely until March 2022, anywhere including out of state, but that I would need to come to the office by March 31, 2022. This seemed fine to me, as I was not certain I wanted to move back to California, but I would have several months to try the new company out and make a decision.
However, I found out upon starting, and reading internal material, that because I was listed as being an employee of a specific California office, I would be taxed as a CA employee- even though I would never set foot in the office in 2021 (and possibly not in 2022, if I decided by the end of March that I did not like the role).
My out-of-Califonia tax advisor told me not to worry about this quite yet - and I fully expected to file a NR-540 CA tax form as a non-resident who did earn some stock from the previous company in 2021- so I expected to pay some CA taxes. But I did not expect to pay taxes on a CA based employer (who has offices in many other locations) when I am not working in CA at all this year. The company has replied about 7 times to different requests I sent with the same "we are required to tax you based on the office you would be working in" because apparently their "you can work remotely without worrying about the state" policy expired Dec 31, 2020- and now they are taxing anyone who would be in CA offices as if they were there. My tax advisor suggested that ultimately this is not up to the company- its up to the law.
Does anyone have any thoughts on how I can handle this? I am sure many people are in a similar situation but I am literally out of CA the entire 2021 year and my previous employer had a very different policy.
Advice? (I am close to just quitting because I already had reservations about this company- but joined due to an area I wanted to grow in that they specialize in)
Thanks!
