Secondary distributors; records

Sec. 11a. Secondary distributors; records. Every secondary distributor of cigarettes, who is required to procure a license under this Act, shall keep within Illinois, at his licensed address, complete and accurate records of cigarettes held, purchased, brought in from without the State, and sold, or otherwise disposed of, and shall preserve and keep within Illinois at his licensed address all invoices, bills of lading, sales records, copies of bills of sale, inventory at the close of each period for which a report is required of all cigarettes on hand, and other pertinent papers and documents relating to the purchase, sale, or disposition of cigarettes. Every sales invoice issued by a secondary distributor to a retailer in this State shall contain the distributor's secondary distributor license number. All books and records and other papers and documents that are required by this Act to be kept shall be kept in the English language, and shall, at all times during the usual business hours of the day, be subject to inspection by the Department or its duly authorized agents and employees. The Department may adopt rules that establish requirements, including record forms and formats, for records required to be kept and maintained by secondary distributors. For purposes of this Section, "records" means all data maintained by the secondary distributors, including data on paper, microfilm, microfiche or any type of machine sensible data compilation. Those books, records, papers, and documents shall be preserved for a period of at least 3 years after the date of the documents, or the date of the entries appearing in the records, unless the Department, in writing, authorizes their destruction or disposal at an earlier date. At all times during the usual business hours of the day any duly authorized agent or employee of the Department may enter any place of business of the secondary distributor without a search warrant and may inspect the premises and the stock or packages of cigarettes therein contained to determine whether any of the provisions of this Act are being violated. If such agent or employee is denied free access or is hindered or interfered with in making such examination as herein provided, the license of the secondary distributor at such premises shall be subject to revocation by the Department. (Source: P.A. 98-1055, eff. 1-1-16 .)