Non Domestic Rates warrants have been passed to Scott & Co, with their letters being issued tomorrow. Although contact by the public should be direct to Scott & Co, there may be the odd phone call. Here’s the breakdown by years of the quantities issued.

2019 – 15

2020 – 34

2021 – 47

2022 – 97

2023 – 612

Please note there has been an unplanned technical fault with the SWF form upgrade today.

ICT are working to restore access to all Open Revenues systems, hopefully this won’t take very much longer. We will update this post as soon as it’s up and running again.

Update 21/11/2023: Please note that issues are ongoing, ICT are still working to resolve this problem but in the meantime please ensure you are making applicants aware that it will take a bit longer for their applications to be reviewed or any decisions to be made, and apologise for any inconvenience this may cause.

RESOLVED: The service have advised Open Revs is back up and running and processing may resume as normal - no new forms have been added it is still the old form, and until they work out what went wrong nothing will be changing. If you experience any further issues please pass via your Senior in the first instance.

Following a discussion between myself and Benefits Processing Supervisor Andrew Grant, I have stressed the importance of the Benefits Team using the Support team mailbox (customer.services.support@moray.gov.uk) should they require assistance with an enquiry rather than revenues@moray.gov.uk. Andrew agreed as confirmed that it was unfair that a reply to a customer’s enquiry could be delayed as a result of Customer Service Advisors having to answer benefits staff enquiries.

Andrew advised that he would ensure that his staff are all aware of the Customer Service Support Team mailbox when assistance is needed and that they should not be using revenues@moray.gov.uk when assistance is needed.

Should and Advisor/Senior see an Email into revenues@moray.gov.uk from a Benefits member of staff asking for assistance, please pick up the Email and reply to the member of staff thinking them for their Email and advise that you have CC’d the Customer Service Support Team into the reply so that they can investigate and get back to the Benefits member of staff directly in due course (or words to that effect).

If you have any questions or concerns please contact the seniors in the first instance, thank you.
Kindest regards, Donna / CS Team Leader

CCDAVA password has been updated - the Lagan scripts has been updated with the new password.

Civica will be copying our upgraded SWF application form into our Live system on Tuesday 21st November. This will have minimal impact on frontline services however there will be a period of around 15 minutes during the day when no one can be in the Discretionary Awards module. Other OpenPortal forms will also be unavailable during these 15 minutes. Civica will give us notice of when exactly this will be.

We will let you know when the service actually go Live with the new version of the form. The form will look different but all the content is still the same. The new form uses updated technology that makes it easier for customers to complete using phones/tablets.

14/11/2023 16:45 – James has confirmed that he has now spoken with his service contact at Scotts who advised that after investigation, it was found that customers were being incorrectly referred back to Moray Council. James contact assured him that this would be addressed as a matter of urgency and apologised for the frustrations that had been caused for customers and Moray Council staff.

10/11/2023 17:02 (original Teams update to Revs Advisors) please note that we are aware of an issue with Scotts redirecting customers back to MC for Ctax accounts that have been passed to them for recovery. James has confirmed that he has raised this with Scotts and is awaiting a call back to discuss. As soon as we have an update this will be posted on the Revenues News Page. However, can I please ask you to keep a note of any further calls you get, including the customer’s account number, date & time of call. Please just keep the tally to yourselves so that we can get it if needed, thank you in advance.

NDR recovery was ran yesterday and the files passed to CFH for production and dispatch. They’re expected to dispatch today, with an issue date of 16/11/23. The breakdown of the output is below.

1st Reminders – 47
2nd Reminders – 8
Final Notices (2013-2023) – 43

Please see the details below for the NDR recovery run this coming Monday 13/11/23. The approx numbers are as follows:

NDR 1st Reminders 55

NDR 2nd Reminders 8

Final Notices 41

Update 11:20: IT have confirmed that the outstanding AllPay file has now picked up and will be included in the overnight file tonight.

Please be advised there were no AllPay Paypoint and Post Office payments in the cash files that picked up last night. IT are aware and are looking into why the AllPay payment file didn’t come through.

Following on from the introduction of the following Taxation mailboxes earlier this year:

• - ctaxbills@moray.gov.uk
• - ctaxforms@moray.gov.uk 
• - ctaxrecovery@moray.gov.uk 
• - Ndr-enq@moray.gov.uk 
• - ratesbills@moray.gov.uk
• - ratesforms@moray.gov.uk
• - ratesrecovery@moray.gov.uk

The Taxation Manager, is currently working with ICT to have the “contact us” Email address on the Ctax web pages changed from revenues@moray.gov.uk to ctaxweb@moray.gov.uk.

The provisional date for the webpages being updated is 13/11/2023, however, due to the volume of work required by ICT this might be extended, as soon as a date is confirmed an update post will be shared to the HUB.

In terms of managing workload, this does not change anything for Customer Services but it will allow over time the Revenues mailbox to be more for HB, Ctax, FSM & Clothing Grant Emails.

James has not shared any plans to ask ICT to create a “ratesweb” address as the contact us Email for NDR/Rates is ndr-enq@moray.gov.uk

If you have any questions please raise to seniors in the first instance.

Thank you

Donna CS Team Leader.

Due to the requirement to upgrade server software it will be necessary to withdraw access to all OPEN-Revenues and D360 software suits from 16:00 on Tuesday 7 November.

Please ensure that you have signed out by then

This will also affect the DHP and SWF online forms.

We do not know how long these upgrade jobs will take so DO NOT attempt to sign in until we have notified you that you may do so. It is possible that if upgrades take longer than envisaged these software suites may not be available until later in the morning of 8 November.

The reminder/final notice files have just gone to CFH for printing and posting later on this week. The notices will be dated 9/11/23. The totals are as follows:

1st Reminders 543

2nd Reminders 127

Final Notices 145

There will also be approx 300 Attachment of Benefit letters going out today which were part of last week’s warrant.

Taxation Support will confirm a definite date for the release date for the reminders/final notices once CFH confirm details.

We can confirm that Taxation will not be operating a Hunt Group. In all cases where a taxpayer wants to speak to a Taxation Team staffer, a support form must be raised. They will then call the person back.

For the avoidance of doubt, advisors must not phone Taxation staffers on their direct dial numbers on behalf of callers. All telephone calls which require contact between back office staffer and taxpayers, must be raised via support form.

There has been a technical issue with the processing of the EMA payments this week. This means that all EMA payments due on Friday 3 November will not be paid until Monday 6 November. We sincerely apologise for any inconvenience this may cause. This matter is completely outwith our control and we are working to identify the root cause to ensure it does not happen in future.

The payment issue affects some, but not all, students. Some students were paid early in error on Friday 20 October so will receive their next payment on Friday 17 November.