Thousands of Lansing taxpayers getting incorrect property tax bills

LANSING — About 16,000 Lansing’s property owners have or will soon receive incorrect tax bills.

The city late Monday night announced in a social media post that incorrect summer tax bills were mailed to some property owners due to a printing mistake. They are believed to be property owners with escrow accounts.

Scott Bean, Mayor Andy Schor’s spokesman, said the error affected “just under 16,000, so not a small amount.”

He explained that the city contracts with a printing business, Extend Your Reach, which has an office in Lansing, and one of their settings was off when they printed bills for taxpayers whose mortgage escrows are set up to cover property taxes.

Bean, who said he received an erroneous bill for his home, said his bill had the wrong property number, and thus the wrong tax information.

The problem “appears to impact those whose taxes are paid through escrow and received bills are watermarked ‘COPY,’” according to a statement from the city posted on Facebook posted late Monday.

Many mortgage companies and banks require homeowners to have an escrow account managed by the financial institution to pay property taxes and insurance.

Messages were left for Extend Your Reach business in Lansing. Bean said the error did not originate in the city treasurer's office.

However, Lansing Treasurer Crystal Thomas, who began her role in January, is reaching out to other municipalities to see if the problem is more widespread.

“She’s talking to other treasurers to see if that’s happening elsewhere,” Bean said.

He added that Thomas told Schor about the problem Monday afternoon, and new bills will be going out in the next day or two.

The deadline for the payment of summer taxes is Sept. 3. Bean said no one has yet paid an erroneous bill because of the city’s mistake.

The city said the correct property tax information can be found online at lansingmi.gov/595/propertytax and that updated bills will be mailed soon.

On Tuesday, the city assessor's office was referring questions to the treasurer's office.

This article originally appeared on Lansing State Journal: Thousands of Lansing taxpayers getting incorrect property tax bills