TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – Cellphones are a way of life, and they all come with a price. In Florida, a new study says customers are getting taxed on mobile devices almost more than any other state.
Oregon had the best cellphone tax rates with customers paying a little under 2 percent extra on their mobile phone bills. Floridians are paying nearly 15 percent more.
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"What we pay is about twice the percentage on your cellphone tax than we do on sales tax," said Robert Weissert of Florida TaxWatch. "The highest sales tax in the state is 7.5 percent, in some places as low as 6. Communications services tax averages about 14 percent, and can reach about 16 percent."
Florida TaxWatch said that it's out of the ordinary for Floridians to get hit with high taxes, but the state's communication tax system is complicated and outdated.
"It was last really reformed in 2001, which was well before the iPhone 6, and cellphones had a very different roll in the early 2000s than they do today," Weissert said.
There have been proposals to cut the taxes, but they've gotten hung up in the legislature
Cellphones get hit with a state, local and federal tax. Pay as you go phones are usually exempt from some fees. The revenue also helps pay for critical services like police and fire dispatch.
"We're concerned about the revenue that's garnered from it locally because that goes back into specific community programs," said Cragin Mosteller of Florida Association of Counties.
The Governor has proposed cutting fees if re-elected. But the Florida Association of Counties said the whole system needs an update first.
"I think we'd like to see everything straightened out," Mosteller said. "We want to continue to empower our communities so that they can serve our citizens, but we definitely understand that there's a need to simplify this process."
An estimated 40 percent of adults have ditched the landline for just wireless.