Tag-office glitch may force auto owners to pay extra in taxes

Editor:

I have an early November birthday. The day before Thanksgiving I realized that I had not paid my car tag tax. I immediately called the car tag office. I was told that in May the tax office had some problems with the compute. I was also told that the company mailing the forms out from Atlanta was having problems. I was notified that I would have to pay a penalty even thought it was not my fault that I did not receive the tax notice.

I went to the tax office and paid my tax and penalty. While there I overheard a gentleman complain that he had not gotten a tag tax bill and two of his relatives had not gotten their tag tax bills. The employee handling his bill said in an off-handed way, I guess they got lost in the mail.

In my opinion, if the tag tax office knew, in May, that they were having computer problems, then by November the problems should have been resolved. If not, then the tag office should have made a public announcement that warned taxpayers of the problems. If the tag office knew that the company in Atlanta doing the mailing was doing a poor job, then why has that problem not been resolved? The Columbia County Tag Office must have coffers overflowing with penalty charges for this year.

Since the tag office is not warning residents of this problem, I thought The Columbia County News-Times could take the pro-active position.

Lorinda Fournier

Evans