[Ian Clayton]

Hi Michael,

I’m not familiar with a granny flat agreement, but I doubt we would be granting a rebate on it. Sounds more like a landlord/tenant arrangement.

We do, however, allow rebates in life tenancy situations, but only where they’re registered on title. We’ve only got a couple of these & they’re single dwellings where the pensioner is paying the rates.

Cheers
Ian

[Ian Clayton]

Hi Andrew,

I received the following email yesterday afternoon confirming missing NOS documents were now uploaded as PDF’s. There were earlier emails advising of the problem.

Hopefully any missing ones are now resolved.

Cheers
Ian

Good Afternoon,
As previously advised NSW LRS experienced technical issues in August 2018. This resulted in your organisation not receiving a complete set of NOS notifications relating to transactions during the period 20-24 August (online portal delivery dates 28 August – 01 September).
Please be assured the integrity of the Land Register has been upheld. The technical issue impacted the delivery of change notifications. At all times the data held in the Land Registry, and available via the NSW LRS Online Portal, was accurate and secure.
NSW LRS understand the importance of these daily NOS notifications and as such have undertaken a full audit relating to the notification issues. This audit identified additional NOS notifications which may not have been sent to your organisation since the issue in August.
Earlier this afternoon we uploaded additional files to your NSW LRS Online Portal account. There will be a separate PDF document for each affected date, with the naming structure “(ref#)_NOS_RERUN_201808xx (xx = affected date)”. You will only receive files for the dates your agency was affected. These have been provided in PDF as we recommend careful scrutiny. Due to the reconstruction process it is possible some of the NOS notifications in the attached documents may have already been sent to you.
Please treat these as historical notifications, with the possibility subsequent updates may have occurred in your systems. Updates may have been entered in your systems based on a recent LRS notification, or via direct entry/update by your own systems or staff. Due to this we request you use caution not to overwrite current data when updating these in your systems.
With this email LRS technical teams are now confident all notifications from the August issue have been delivered. LRS are also confident all subsequent notifications in September and October have been successful.
We apologise for the impact of the notification failures, and are committed to continual improvement to reduce the risk of these issues recurring.
Please contact us if you have any additional questions regarding this matter.
Regards,

Chris Knight
Business Support Officer,
New Business and Information Services
e: electronic.services@nswlrs.com.au
1 Prince Albert Road, Queens Square SYDNEY

[Ian Clayton]

Hi Fiona,

We have one under construction in Mid-Western and we have categorised the land as Business. In our case, basically the whole of the property will be solar panels and any gazing of livestock that might be happening on the land would be secondary to the electricity generation.

Cheers
Ian

[Ian Clayton]

Hi Maria,
If an invoice has issued to the new owners, I think they are liable.
Sec 217 (1) & (3) of The Roads Act make it pretty clear the “owner” has to pay. There also doesn’t seem to be any requirement to give notice of the estimate (though I agree that’s good practice).
Thanks
Ian

[Ian Clayton]

Hi Emma,

We had a couple of properties similar to your property 2 in our sales over the last few years. In our cases, the old owners or relatives were unlikely to surface.

We put a special condition in the contract to make it clear that the purchaser was only buying the land/fixed improvements, and not any other possessions that may be located there. We also had the auctioneer make a similar statement on auction day. No other action was taken, essentially leaving it the old & new owner to sort out if an issue arose.

Cheers
Ian

[Ian Clayton]

Hi Jenette,

We do produce a map & have it available for viewing. I’m only aware of one person who looks at it (he asks for it each year). We have MapInfo, & I produce it from a spread sheet list of the properties & categories. Would that be an option for you ?

Cheers
Ian

[Ian Clayton]

Hi David

Mid-Westerns hardship policy allows for deferment interest free for Residential or Farmland properties where rates have increased above 25% as a result of a increase in value in a Gval.

The “Deferment” is not all that helpful, because it requires entering into a payment arrangement in accordance with the debt recovery policy. Unless otherwise approved by the GM, the debt recovery policy requires arrangements to satisfy the debt by 30/6.
Full policy is at :-
http://www.midwestern.nsw.gov.au/globalassets/S_2572/policies/pol—hardship-policy—march-2014.pdf

I can’t recall receiving an application under this policy.

Cheers
Ian

[Ian Clayton]

Hi Sue

I’m not aware of any requirement either way. Our agent does included reference to Sec 713 LGA & the fact they are acting under instructions from Council. I think the agent might want to mention it because the owners will likely see the ad.
If you would like to email me, I can send a copy of one of our recent ones (ian.clayton@midwestern.nsw.gov.au).

Cheers
Ian

[Ian Clayton]

Hi Tracey

We refund Bpay payments the same as any other payment method. The owner has to fill out our refund request form including providing EFT details. We don’t issue any refunds via cheque.

We may also request evidence from the person to confirm it was them that made the Bpay payment. This happens mostly when there’s been a property sale or we have some doubt.

Cheers
Ian

[Ian Clayton]

Hi Adele,

I agree that Mr A may have some basis to be able to claim his rates payments back, but I don’t think interest would be payable.

It sounds like Council issued the rates in good faith based on the information it held, and the amounts were paid voluntarily.

I think I would respond by saying that, under the circumstances, you’re not aware of any legislation that would entitle Mr A to a refund or any interest payment. If they consider that he is, I would invite them to particularise their contention.

It would be simpler to consider the basis they put forward for the claim, rather than to come up with a defence to the general request from scratch.

Cheers
Ian

[Ian Clayton]

Hi Rod,

We don’t rate Council land, except where it’s leased to a third party. The advantage to Council is that the rates previously paid to ourselves is now paid to us by our other ratepayers. A few hundred thousand off our operating budgets every year. A quick summary of the legislation we rely on is below – basically the definitions of Public Place & Public Land. To my thinking, it’s easier to fit a car park into this interpretation than some of our other operational properties eg admin centre, depots etc.
Regards,
Ian

554 What land is rateable?
All land in an area is rateable unless it is exempt from rating.

556 What land is exempt from all rates, other than water supply special rates and sewerage special rates?

(1) The following land is exempt from all rates, other than water supply special rates and sewerage special rates:
(a) land that is a public place,

The following are definitions contained in the Dictionary forming part of the Local Government Act :-

“public place” means:
(a) a public reserve, public bathing reserve, public baths or public swimming pool, or
(b) a public road, public bridge, public wharf or public road-ferry, or
(c) a Crown reserve comprising land reserved for future public requirements, or
(d) public land or Crown land that is not:
(i) a Crown reserve (other than a Crown reserve that is a public place because of paragraph (a), (b) or (c)), or
(ii) a common, or
(iii) land subject to the Trustees of Schools of Arts Enabling Act 1902 , or
(iv) land that has been sold or leased or lawfully contracted to be sold or leased, or
(e) land that is declared by the regulations to be a public place for the purposes of this definition.

public land” means:
Any land (including a public reserve) vested in or under the control of the council, but does not include:
(a) a public road, or
(b) land to which the Crown Lands Act 1989 applies, or
(c) a common, or
(d) land subject to the Trustees of Schools of Arts Enabling Act 1902 , or
(e) a regional park under the National Parks and Wildlife Act 1974 .

[Ian Clayton]

Hi Andrew,

We on-charge skip trace fees under Sec 605 that our debt management agent charge Council, when we are unable to contact the ratepayer. I think “reasonable” might be in the eye of the beholder, but if it’s the fee from a professional provider, I’d call it reasonable.

Cheers
ian

[Ian Clayton]

Hi Paula,

We’re not planning to print this on our notice, unless we get a directive from Council. I think it will add confusion for our ratepayers who will already have numerous changes on the notice. If Council wants to get that message out to the public, it would be better to use our other communication channels and tell the story in full.

[Ian Clayton]

Hi Suzi,

Luckily for us, our current GM delegations includes a blanket cover for Council functions from other Acts. The delegations from the GM down will need to be sorted out.

[Ian Clayton]

Hi Cherie,

Midwestern are planning to print separate lines, as long as we can fit them in.

Cheers
Ian

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