Human error, the amount of money involved, and the number of changes to the rating system last year contributed to the Otago Regional Council’s rates error this year, the council says.
Council chief executive Richard Saunders informed councillors last month that, in Oamaru, 972 ratepayers were overcharged for public transport.
In Dunedin, the council failed to rate 13,789 ratepayers for flood protection after the Leith indirect rating area was expanded beyond the 40,900 ratepayers already paying for the flood protection.
A report to the council’s audit and risk subcommittee this month said the Oamaru public transport rating error meant the council over-collected $5297, but the Leith flood protection mistake meant the council had under-collected $219,972.
"The net rate shortfall was $214,675 which was 0.29% of the total amount rated of $74,709,583," the report said.
Consequently, the total amount rated was in line with the expected amount, it said.
"Both errors were due to a combination of human error, system issues, the nature of the rates changes being made, and the complexity involved in the rates setting and rates strike process in general."
To address the errors, the rating-system software was proposed to be upgraded next year and a new role was introduced in the council’s rates team to oversee the rates-strike process, the report said.
Mr Saunders said there had also been "wholesale" changes to the rates collected by the council last year.
"One of the contributing factors in this recent rate strike was the number of rating changes we made in one year," he said.
"We're unlikely to do that again in the future and so if we are making, you know, one change or even a couple, the ability for staff to cast their eye on that [is useful] as opposed to I think we've probably made the best part of a dozen."
As a result manual checks of the automated rating programme would be easier.
He confirmed his view that dealing with the rates error was an operational matter and councillor input had not been required.
At the beginning of November, the council issued a statement apologising for the mistake, which caught at least one councillor off guard — Cr Michael Laws blasted the council’s leadership after learning of the errors through the statement to media.
Cr Laws is not on the subcommittee and was not present at last week’s meeting.
