THE CHIEF'S APPRAISAL: Did you get your tax statement? Your homestead exemption?
Unless you have a mortgage company paying your taxes, you should have received your 2011 tax statement. According to Texas law, you are responsible for paying your tax whether or not you receive a statement. If you do not have your statement and you do not have a mortgage company responsible for paying the tax out of an escrow account, now is the time to contact our office so we can send you a duplicate statement. You can contact us by calling 432-332-6834 or come by the office at 1301 E. Eighth St.
Taxes will become delinquent on Feb. 1, at which time we will have more than one taxpayer come in and adamantly state that they should not have to pay penalty and interest fees because they did not get the original statement back in October. The law does not recognize “failure to receive” a tax statement as a legitimate excuse and, as a result, will not allow us to waive the penalty and interest fees.
If history is an indicator, we will receive thousands of payments postmarked Dec. 31, and we will start getting calls on Jan. 2, 2012, wanting to know if we received their payment. It will take about two weeks to completely process the payments, and we will not be able to check on your payment status until it is posted. If your envelope is postmarked by Dec. 31, our records will reflect a December posting. If you can’t get to the post office before the last scheduled pickup time, you may want to come by our office and drop your payment in our drop box on the west side of the building. If you want a copy of your receipt, you will need to enclose a stamped self-addressed envelope.
New this year is credit card processing in our office. Up until now, if you wanted to pay with your credit card, you had to go online or call the processing company. Now we can take credit card payments at the cashier counter, or you can go to our website. To pay with a credit card, go to our website at www.ectorcad.org and search for your account, then select the “open all” details button and go to the bottom of the page. In order to process a payment with a credit card, the service company charges a processing fee of 2.5%. Usually the businesses where you use your credit card absorb the fees. However, when you pay your property taxes with a credit card, we cannot absorb the processing fees. We cannot pay the fees because we get our funds from the taxing entities and if we paid credit card processing fees it would be with tax dollars. Those taxpayers who pay with cash or checks do not want to fund our budget to pay someone else’s credit card processing fees. You can also pay with an e-check through our website. The e-check processing fee is a flat $2.00.
EXEMPTION INFORMATION
Homestead, over 65 and disability exemptions can still be processed for the 2011 tax year. These exemptions can reduce your tax liability from 20-25 percent. If the tax statement for your principal residence did not reflect a homestead exemption, you need to contact our office at 432-332-6834 or come by the office at 1301 E. 8th Street. You will need to bring your driver’s license and a copy of a registration receipt for a vehicle owned by you. Both documents must show the same address as the property on which you wish to file your residential homestead exemption.
If you are over 65 or disabled, you can also apply to pay your taxes in four equal installments from January to July.
