Last week my wife got a call from KS Revenue saying that we owed nearly $900 from 2010, she was told that we would have to set up a payment plan to avoid it going to collections; and that we could set the amount and the remaining balance would be paid when we filed our 2012 return. I called up KS Revenue; and was told a very different story; we couldn’t set our own repayment amount, it’s going to cost a minimum of $75.37 per month to be paid over 12 months and the remainder of the balance would have to be paid ourselves and not automatically. I also was told that we couldn’t pay by credit/debit card, and they don’t automatically draft payments on our chosen payment date. On top of the different story; we have to pay a $10 administration fee to setup a payment plan.
Yesterday we received a letter from KS Revenue with the details of our payment plan; a day after the agreed first payment date I might add. The letter shows a figure of more than $907 which is $30 more than the original amount, and now it says we can pay by credit/debit card. Two reps with different stories and a letter that contradicts them both, it’s true what they say; the left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing in governmental departments, it really is a joke!
Then there was the ignorant landlord incident on Sunday. And yesterday, my wife went ahead of booked a few viewings for houses as we need to move from where we live (I’ll explain why in a moment). We looked at three houses, the first was filthy with mold and multiple issues and the owner seemed to think it was fine and ready to rent, and it was the most expensive at $1000 pcm. Then we looked at a great three bedroom, 1.5 bath house that was perfect at $950 pcm, we both loved this house. Then we looked at a third which had a cockroach in the fridge, that was basically the end of the viewing for us, not good; although it was the cheapest as $850. I’m frustrated because the house we really loved costs $1900 to move in before physical moving costs and switching of utilities costs. Money we don’t have at this moment; we’ll have it when we get our tax return but we don’t know when that’ll come with all this fiscal cliff BS, so we’ve let the house go!
Now; I’ll explain why we have to move; the place we live is way too small; 950ft² is not big enough for two adults, two kids and a rabbit. But the big issue is the lack of maintenance; there is water leaking into the bathtub when the shower is running. The maintenance guy is non-responsive; we have called and left messages, he promised us a call about getting a plumber out to fix the issue; but that callback never came; that was over five weeks ago. After checking out different brands of bathtubs we tried to get a hold of the owner and ask if he could just replace it. On Monday, we received a call from the owner, for whom we previously had no telephone number, who apologised, gave us $100 off February’s rent and promised the maintenance guy would call the next day; it’s now three days after and still no call. Clearly the issue is not going to be fixed, it’s almost six weeks since we reported it!