By Yepoka Yeebo
DNAinfo Reporter/Producer
MANHATTAN — Bagels are tax free, unless of course you want a schmear, in which case, pay up, the Wall Street Journal reported.
Under orders from cash-strapped Albany, state tax officials have started enforcing an obscure tax rule which forces stores to charge tax on any bagel prepared in the store, be it by slicing, topping with cream cheese or butter or just eaten on the premises, according to the state Department of Taxation and Finance, the paper reported.
Whole bagels eaten off-site are still tax-free.
The taxes have upset both bagel purveyors and their hungry customers, according to the Journal.
"[Customers] felt we were nickel-and-diming them. They thought we were charging them to slice a bagel," bagel shop owner Kenneth Greene said of the extra eight cents he was charging, the paper reported.
Greene, the owner of 33 Bruegger's Bagel franchises throughout New York, was unaware of the law and had to pay a "significant" amount in back-taxes, according to the Journal.
It was unclear if the tax would apply to bagel shops in Manhattan as it was not clearly spelled out in the tax code, but a tax department spokesman told the Journal their website would be updated soon.
"I hope they don't come after me for that," Florence Wilpon, owner of Ess-a-Bagel in Manhattan told the Journal.
