RICHMOND, Va. — Richmond resident Sherrell Thompson is having finance frustrations that may sound familiar. In short, she said Richmond kept money from her that she never knew should've been returned to her.
“I was a little upset, because it's money that I paid to the city and it didn't belong to them, so why wouldn't you give it back to me?” Thompson said. “If it happened to you, you would want your money."
In May of this year, Thompson said she received an incorrect car tax bill, so she went up to City Hall to sort out the issue.
In doing so, she said a finance employee alerted her to a past $44 credit on her account that apparently stemmed from a personal property tax overpayment in 2020.
“Throughout the past five years, did the city ever tell you that you had this credit?” reporter Tyler Layne asked.
“No, I was never notified about the credit," Thompson said. "How are you going to keep something that doesn't belong to you, especially when you didn't notify me?”
Even when paying her personal property taxes in the years that followed, she said a credit never showed up on her bill and was never applied.
So Thompson said she asked the Finance Department to apply her $44 to her current personal property tax bill, but she was then told by a supervisor that wasn't possible because the three year statute of limitations for claiming refunds had passed.
“She was like, ‘No, ma'am, unfortunately not. Actually the representative you spoke to shouldn't have told you about the credit because we can't issue it,'" Thompson recalled.
But for Thompson, it's not even about the money.
“It just didn't make sense. It's just the whole principle about it. If you give me a bill, you're expecting me to pay it and pay it on time, and I do. And so if you owe me something, I expect you to give it to me in a timely fashion. For five years, y'all let the credit sit on my account and didn't say a word," Thompson said.
She reached out to CBS 6 after our story last week about a draft inspector general report that found between 2017-2022, the city kept more than $3 million in excess business taxes without notifying the business owners and then converted the money to city funds after the three-year statutory period.
The report concluded that finance did not violate any laws because the law did not require the department to notify taxpayers about credits, but it did cite "confusion" over how the city handled credits and refunds due to advice given by the city attorney's office.
In one example, the report stated an executor of an estate inquired with the finance department whether they owed any outstanding taxes. In reality, a finance employee found they actually had a $629 credit. However, a city attorney advised the finance employee "not to send a refund unless it was requested."
In light of the investigation, the city council passed an ordinance in March 2024 requiring the finance department to notify business owners of meals tax credits and business license credits within 90 days. To this date, the city said it has communicated with account holders regarding meals tax refunds but is still trying to figure out how many business license credits exist.
“I saw the story about the businesses, and I said, 'I'm in that same situation,' and sometimes you just don't want to keep quiet because you're kind of tired of it happening," Thompson said.
She now wants others to be aware that it may not just be businesses impacted by this problem, but residents too.
"I think that they should do the right thing and let the citizens know that they have a credit," Thompson said. "What system do you have to notify residents if they overpaid?"
City spokesperson Tamara Jenkins said the standard procedures for personal property tax credits include automatically rolling forward any applicable credits to the next billing cycle. She said the finance department cannot comment directly on Thompson's issue but will review her account to "ensure all processes have been correctly applied" and then share the findings with her.
Currently, an audit is underway to determine the number and amount of existing business tax credits. When asked whether auditors will also be looking into any possible personal property tax credits, Jenkins said that would be "at the discretion of the Office of the Auditor.”
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