Cr Ros Heit
May 18, 2016
The South Burnett Regional Council will return to half-yearly rates notices next financial year.
At Wednesday’s monthly meeting, Councillors heard that reverting from the current quarterly system back to a twice-yearly system will have a positive impact on the Council’s bottom line.
A 2015 survey that attracted 2138 responses also indicated that annual or bi-annual rates notices are preferred by almost 70 per cent of ratepayers.
Council officers said the stronger cash flows that would occur twice each year would generate an extra $120,000 a year in interest from investments.
It would also shave $34,300 from annual postage costs and $13,700 from agency fees.
The motion to revert to bi-annual rates notices – which will be issued in February and August – was moved by Cr Ros Heit and seconded by Cr Danita Potter.
Cr Heit said the community had made it clear they wanted the Council to be more efficient during the March elections.
“This is one way we can do that,” Cr Heit said.
To help minimise the impact of the change-over, the Council will extend the normal discount period from 30 to 60 days, and also extend the period at which interest begins being applied on overdue rates from 60 to 90 days, for the first half-yearly rates notice only.
Cr Heit said that apart from savings the move would generate, returning to half-yearly notices would also be less confusing for some people.
Under the new system, all notices will include six-monthly water usage charges.
At the moment, these charges only appeared on every second quarterly notice, Cr Heit said.
This made it difficult for some people to budget properly, and made others believe rates had suddenly risen when they compared a quarterly bill that included water usage charges against a previous one that didn’t.
However, Cr Heit said she was aware the changeover would be stressful for some people when they received their first half-yearly bill, particularly those on fixed incomes.
She thought it was important for Council to communicate with the community as widely as possible about the change, and said she’d encourage anyone – but particularly those on fixed incomes – to move onto an instalment payment plan where rates were automatically deducted every week, fortnight or month.
Cr Spud Jones said he agreed pensioners were likely to suffer most, but thought some didn’t consider instalment plans because they believed if they did this they wouldn’t receive the early payment discount.
“All the same, a $168,000 saving is worthwhile and it’s what the public have asked us to do,” Cr Jones said.
Finance General Manager Lester Schumacher said providing the full amount of rates owing was paid before the end of the discount period, ratepayers would receive the discount whatever payment method they chose to use.
CEO Gary Wall added that pensioners would also still receive the annual $400 discount on their rates – $200 from the State Government and $200 from Council – whatever payment method they chose.
Cr Heit said because the first six-monthly notices will be issued in August, she would encourage anyone who wanted to minimise the impact of the change to take up an instalment plan as soon as possible.
- Related article: Half-Yearly Rates Back On The Table
