[Linda Fury]

Wingecarribee Council has just changed contractors for the waste contract.

As part of this all do the residents of the shire are receiving new garbage bins.

We are delivering bins as per the charges on the the rates notices. This is where the dilemma begins.

We have some residents that are now getting 2 sets of bins (2 garbage & 2 recycling) as they have been charged for 2 services previously – but have only had 1 set of bins. Some of these charges date back to 1993.

The residents have never noticed that they have been charged for 2 services as they saw “2” on the notices and thought it was the 2 bins they have, garbage and recycling.

Council’s procedure is to only credit the current year and no prior year adjustments.

Has any one had any challenge to this sort of thing, or does anyone know of and court cases that have happened about this???

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

[Darryl Telfer]

Hi Linda, for what it may be worth……….

Went through this myself in 1997 when I started at Council and contract / services were in chnage over – nice timing eh! I didn’t get a lot of support at the time (yeah, don’t know, it’s a bit hard, go and ask so and so,…. etc) but we pretty much held our ground on the S574 provision of 30 days to appeal against a levy (although we are a bit more lenient than 30 days it they must ask in the same year that the notice is issued).
You also should consider what a reasonable person would understand “Domestic Waste Charge 2 units” to mean. Think about what other general or specific information has been supplied to the ratepayer community in the past – for example we have issued brochures with our rates each year for a long time now that explains what the typical ratepayer pays and what it covers. Of course whatever approach you take it should be consistent and agreed by the waste unit – it’s their revenue.

[Susan Pardy]

Hi Linda,
I know that this is a delay in responding to your post, but we have just gone through the same thing (we have delivered two new green waste bins to people with ‘two’ waste services … and this has caused them to query why they have been charged for two all along). In our instance we were able to locate the bin register which documented the bins (exact serial numbers) that were originally supplied to the property and have used this as evidence that they did have the two services at one point in time (regardless of whether the bins are missing or no longer being used). If we did provide a credit, it would only go back one year, but so far have not had to do this.
Cheers,
Susan

[Melissa McCulloch]

Hi Linda
You could rely upon the Recovery of Imposts Act and set up a series of letters asking the owners who have been overcharged to provide evidence by way of receipts for payment to qualify for any refund from 1993 onwards – the issue you may have with this is locating all owners where there has been a sale.

If evidence is submitted to Council and such evidence (receipts) is acceptable (payment within a 12 month period) then Council should refund those moneys but only to the name or entity on the receipt.

Further letters should be sent confirming a refund or declining a refund.
Regards
Mel

[Suzy Melki]

Can you please provide me with information on refunds for additional Domestic Waste Charges, and if so how many years do you go back.
Can you please Email me any policy or Procedures covering Domestic Waste Services.

Thank you in advance.

[Author]

Posts