Software – Edgefield County tax office

Letters to The Editor

Edgefield Advertiser

I hope that all of your readers saw the article in your March 16 edition written by Tiffany Ireland concerning the problem with software in the Edgefield County tax office and the mistakes that had been made on many tax bills that went out in 2015 and have been paid by taxpayers.  My husband and I are victims of this mistake and would not have known about it if I had not read your notice.  When I called the tax office to ask what to do and how to get it corrected they didn’t seem to know anything about the problem.  Finally I talked to a person who agreed with my findings on the mistake but when we received, in the mail, several days later what should have been the correction and refund it was worse than before we started.  One parcel had been corrected but the second one that we had paid $337.41 last year and should have had a $43.37 refund had increased to $2,249.80 and we were given until March 20 to pay it.  We immediately took it all to the courthouse in person when no-one on the phone seemed to know how this could possibly have happened.  It took half the day but they were all very nice to us and three people worked on it trying to get to the bottom of it.  After we went to lunch and went back to their office they had figured it out and told us that they found the mistake and we would receive the corrected copy in the mail in a few days.  I hope this doesn’t happen to anyone else in the county but please be aware that it happened to us on Good Friday.  Thank you Advertiser for informing us of this problem.

Betty and Wallace Widgeon, North Augusta, SC   29860