All property tax dues will from now on be reflected on one bill instead of multiple bills on the Kolkata Municipal Corporation’s (KMC) website, mayor Firhad Hakim said on Saturday.
The entire tax amount due can be viewed under the “All Bills” head on the “assessment department” page of the KMC’s website. (KMC home page > KMC departments >assessment and collection > make online payment >all bills)
Most people clear only the current financial year’s tax, the intimation of which is sent to them via text messages. This gives them a false impression that they have no tax dues left.
In many cases, the property owners suddenly get a notice from the KMC informing them that a big amount of tax has remained unpaid. The pending tax amount grows over the years as penalty and interest is added to the principal due amount.
“Earlier there used to separate tax bills. I myself got confused despite being the city’s mayor. I paid the tax pending shown in one bill and my pending tax became zero. Then on another day I found out that I had more taxes due. I was surprised because I had already paid the tax,” Hakim said.
“So I told the municipal commissioner to do something. We have now created a system where one bill will reflect all the pending taxes (against an assessee number),” Hakim added.
Officials of the KMC said that while paying taxes property owners usually clear the bill for the current financial year that is shown as periodic demand (PD) on the KMC website. Once the due shown under this head is cleared the taxpayers are shown that they had zero dues.
But there could still be some dues under two other heads on the website that tax payers rarely check.
“The PD or the current year’s pending tax amount is sent via text message. So people clear that and think they have cleared all dues. But this was not the case. This is why we have now introduced the new head called ‘All Bills’ where people would be able to see all pending tax, including the outstanding taxes from previous financial years and increase after period reassessment of tax,” said a KMC official.
A south Calcutta resident recounted an experience where he was stumped to know about pending taxes. “I had purchased a flat and did the mutation to transfer the property in my name. I cleared all pending taxes and was told by the KMC that I had no dues left,” he said.
A few days ago a friend of his while checking the KMC site found out that his friend had pending taxes for that property since 2006-07.
The KMC had never intimated the man about the dues. He always cleared the property tax for the current financial year by visiting the KMC’s website but never checked the other heads. “How can a common man know that he has to look into multiple sections to find out his pending taxes?” he asked.
KMC officials said that though a taxpayer will be able to see all pending tax under “All Bills”, they will have the option to clear a part of it as someone may not have the money to clear all dues at once.
Officials advised that people visiting a KMC office to clear taxes should ask the person at the counter to tell them the entire pending tax amount against the assesssee number of the property.