Kiama Council has completed the first stage of its waste services reconciliation, reviewing accounts of the 9,953 residents who pay for our bin collection service.
Council identified 37 mistakes, an error rate of 0.37 per cent.
The review found 6 residents were overcharged a total of $18,000 since 2018 for the size of the bin being collected from their properties.
There were 31 residents undercharged a total of $49,000 since 2005.
Council is providing credits to those overcharged.
Those undercharged have been charged the correct amount in their 2023-24 rates and charges notice.
Council accepts responsibility and will not seek to retrospectively claim the amounts undercharged.
The reconciliation involved comparing waste charges processed by the Rates Team with the physical bin register maintained by the Waste Depot to identify discrepancies.
Council staff then visited those households with discrepancies to confirm what service was actually required.
Council will now be conducting such reconciliations every two years, to reduce future errors.
Internal controls will be added to further reduce the chances of this occurring in the future.
