Income Taxes

9 Months Ended

Sep. 30, 2011

Income Taxes [Abstract]

Income Taxes

Note D – Income Taxes

Our third quarter 2011 income tax provision of $8.3 million resulted in an effective income tax rate of 40.6%. Our income tax provision of $19.6 million for the first nine months of 2011 resulted in an effective income tax rate of 39.9%. Our effective income tax rate is derived by estimating pretax income and income tax expense for the year ending December 31, 2011. The effective income tax rate calculated for the third quarter and first nine months of 2011 is higher than the federal statutory rate of 35.0%, primarily due to the addition of state income taxes.

Harte-Hanks, or one of our subsidiaries, files income tax returns at the federal level in the U.S., as well as in various U.S. state and foreign jurisdictions. For U.S. state and foreign returns, we are no longer subject to tax examinations for tax years prior to 2006. For U.S. federal returns, we are no longer subject to tax examinations for tax years prior to 2008.

We have elected to classify any interest expense and penalties related to income taxes within income tax expense in our Consolidated Statements of Operations. We did not have a significant amount of interest or penalties accrued at September 30, 2011. We had approximately $0.1 million of interest and penalties accrued at December 31, 2010.