Fiscal Year 2004 Proposed Budget

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OFFICE OF THE TREASURER
OPERATIONS DIVISION

PROGRAM MISSION: To maximize customer convenience by efficiently processing all incoming revenue, effectively managing the billing and decal programs, and promoting electronic methods of payments, while providing high quality service necessary to meet the needs and expectations of all customers.

The Operations Division is comprised of three sections: Licensing, Revenue Processing and Management Information and Billing.

The Licensing Section is responsible for managing the issuance of County decals for motor vehicles and trailers. This entails maintaining, verifying, balancing, and auditing records of decal sales and issues, ensuring the integrity of assigned decal numbers on the personal property file for all decals, and the transmitting of files to the printer for the actual production of decals. Since the adoption of a $24 decal fee, this section has increased customer service by hand-delivering decals to taxpayers requiring immediate attention. In addition, the section enters change of address data received from taxpayers into the personal property file and initiates correspondence to exchange decals, if necessary. The section also maintains the lost or stolen decal file.

The section is also responsible for the initial sale and renewal of County dog licenses. Applications are received, verified, and entered into a database, which is shared weekly with the Animal Welfare League of Arlington. Tags are mailed to pet owners, and renewal reminders are prepared and mailed monthly.

The Revenue Processing Section is comprised of the Customer Service Unit and the Mail Unit. The Customer Service Unit processes all types of County directly remitted revenues. These include real estate taxes; utility payments; personal property taxes; transient occupancy taxes; short-term rental taxes; county decal fees; sidewalk, curb and gutter assessments; cigarette taxes; business license taxes; parking tickets; meals taxes; ambulance fees; and permit fees. The section also processes payments received by other County departments and agencies (CRIFs). After daily processing, payment files are transmitted for posting to the mainframe accounts receivable file.

Payments are received by cash, check, money order, credit card, and debit cards. Transactions arrive by mail, or in the case of credit card payments, may be received via telephone or Internet. Payments are entered into the cash register system based on bills presented by the customer or research done by the customer service representative. The section acts as primary liaison with other County departments on revenue processing matters.

This section operates an SII PC based revenue processing system. Acting as liaison with the manufacturer, the section proposes and monitors software modifications and enhancements.

The Mail Unit handles all incoming and outgoing mail for the Treasurer's Office. Incoming mail is picked-up, sorted, opened and distributed. Over 300,000 pieces are received annually. Outgoing mail is also delivered to the County mailroom or the post office.

The Management Information and Billing Section's duties include: maintaining the real estate accounts receivable file where accounts are adjusted as necessary to correct errors in assessment; controlling the process of individual bill preparation to ensure that they are mailed at least one month prior to each semi-annual installment due date; preparing, maintaining, processing, and posting mortgage company and tax service mass billings; preparing, posting, and mailing bills for supplemental and Public Service Corporation assessments; operating the automated payment service (APS) and the 1-888-2-PAY-TAX service (telephone and internet) for payment of real estate and personal property taxes, parking tickets and utility bills; maintaining records on exempt and deferred assessments; assisting taxpayers and title searchers with inquiries concerning real estate taxes; acting as liaison with the division of Real Estate Assessments; preparing annual real estate tax write-off and delinquency reports for the County Board as required by the Code of Virginia; and preparing bills and receiving payments for the sidewalk, curb and gutter assessment program. The section is responsible for maintaining records on delinquent accounts for the past 20 years and for pre-processing any payments received on them. In addition, due to bank processing of payments, the number of adjustments and refunds has increased substantially.

The section maintains the personal property tax accounts receivable file. Accounts are adjusted as necessary to correct errors in assessment and/or collections. Abatements are entered to resolve errors caused by revenue processing system malfunction; initiate refunds due to overpayments; resolve errors; and process bills returned by the bank. This section receives assessments from the Commissioner of the Revenue and oversees the bill preparation and mailing process and responds to tax inquiries from taxpayers and employees of other local tax jurisdictions. This section prepares the data for the annual reports of written-off and delinquent taxes (other than real estate) for the County Board as required by the Code of Virginia; prepares and mails bills for Public Service Corporation personal property taxes based on assessments received from the Commissioner of the Revenue; and processes adjustments and refunds on parking violations. This section receives, processes, and tracks payments for estimated income tax and prepares weekly, monthly, and annual reports on the tax to the Virginia Department of Taxation. This section also handles the production, maintenance, pre-processing, and non-payment follow-up for fleet billings of personal property tax.

The section maintains the business license, omitted business license (OBL), meals tax and omitted meals tax accounts receivable file. This includes the monthly preparation and mailing of tax bills based on assessments made by the Commissioner of the Revenue, the control and balancing of all transactions, reliefs, refunds, and abatements processed, and handling of taxpayer inquiries on OBL accounts.

This section also operates the imaging system by encoding and imaging selected payments and bills, which for some reason could not be forwarded to the bank for processing.

SIGNIFICANT BUDGET HIGHLIGHTS:

• Because of state budget cuts affecting funding for the Treasurer's Office, a reduction in operating expenditures was taken.

• Increased funding for materials and postage for the permit parking program which will now permanently reside in the Treasurer's office budget.

• A decrease in State Compensation Board funding. Action was taken by the Compensation Board by authority of Section 15.2-1636.8 et.seq, Code of Virginia. This action was imposed by the Compensation Board as a result of new revenue forecasts by the Governor.

• Revenue reduction due to decreased parkulator revenue applied across all Treasurer program budgets.

PERFORMANCE MEASURES: Licensing Section

Objective: To reduce the amount of time it takes to process and mail vehicle decals, visitor permits and dog licenses.

PERFORMANCE MEASURES: Revenue Processing Section/Mail Unit

Objective: To help promote the sale of Smart Cards for parking meters and provide options to enhance the functions of the revenue processing system.

PERFORMANCE MEASURES: Management Information Billing Section

Objective: To reduce the amount of time it takes to process and mail refund checks for overpaid or relieved accounts.

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