Information/Forms

NEW INFORMATION:

HIPAA - Business Associate Agreement  - for all participants submitting or plans on submitting EMS and/or Health debts - click here to access the document. Sign and send to your office below:

1. NCACC: Attn: Kathy DeMay - PO Box 1488, Raleigh, NC  27602-1488  

2. NCLM: Attn: Wanda Veasey - PO Box 3069, Raleigh, NC  27602-3069

Clearinghouse clean-up for 2008

The Clearinghouse has recently begun work on reducing the amount of debts that are invalid for debt setoff:

• Expired Debts - Amounts: November 2007: $ 1,394,082.13  - November 2006: $ 5,126,072.63

• Non-complaint - Debts that were submitted with compliant dates well into the future, 2009 or beyond.  Emails and/or phone calls were sent to each effected local government on December 4 notifying them of this and instructions for accessing and correcting.

• Rejected by the Department of Revenue - at the beginning of November 2007 there were 2,464 Social Security Numbers that the Department of Revenue rejected and provided on a report to the Clearinghouse. The Clearinghouse scanned this report and created a report for each local government of their debtors that were rejected. There were 186 local governments effected totaling $ 620,610.89 in debts that would never be collected. Emails were sent to each effected local government on November 6 notifying them of this and instructions for accessing and processing.

• Invalid Names - Businesses or missing first and/or last names. Debts submitted without a Last Name and at least a first letter of first name are rejected by the Department of Revenue.  There were 371 debtors from 53 local governments with a total debt amount of $ 283,948.73

2007 Setoff Debt Training Workshops

1) ASHEVILLE - September 10 (Asheville-Buncombe Technical Community College, Enka Campus - Haynes 200 1459 Sand Hill Rd, Candler, NC  28715)

2) CORNELIUS - September 11 - (Town Hall, Community Room #103, 21445 Catawba Ave, Cornelius, NC  28031)

3) FAYETTEVILLE - September 12 - (Fayetteville Public Works Facility, Operations Building. 955 Old Wilmington Rd, Fayetteville, NC 28302)

4) GREENVILLE - September 18 -  (Sheppard Memorial Library, Mtg. Room A, 530 Evans St, Greenville, NC 27858)

5) RALEIGH - September 20 -  (Quorum Center, 323 West Jones St, Raleigh, NC 27603)

2007 Workshop Documents/Handouts:

• Workshop Agenda (pdf)

• Workshop Information (pdf)

• Workshop PowerPoint presentation - NCACC & NCLM (pdf)

• Workshop PowerPoint presentation - Clearinghouse (pdf)

• Social Security Number guide (pdf)

2007 Workshop Highlights:

• Social Security Numbers - do NOT print Social Security Numbers, in its entirety or masked such as ***-**-1234, on notification letters (see Social Security Number guide)

• Refund requests from the Department of Revenue - funds must be returned quickly. These refund request letters are sent from from the Department of Revenue to the Clearinghouse.  The Clearinghouse determines which local government entity received the funds and sends a copy of the letter and all relevant information to either the North Carolina League of Municipalities or the Association of County Commissioners. The League or Association is responsible for collecting the funds from the local government entity along with the Clearinghouse's $15 collection fee and returning the to the Department of Revenue.  In addition, the Department of Revenue returns their $5 collection fee to the debtor.

An Excel file now available for each setoff file - click here for more information

Download Instructions for Setoff File (Client Software Users) - click here to view

Create the Required Notification Letters using the DebtSetoff software and MS Word:

We've created step-by-step instructions for creating a file of debtors in our software and then using Microsoft Word to generate the letters.

• PDF format

• Microsoft Word format (use this to enter your own notes/comments and then save for future reference)

Not doing window envelopes and need labels?

• PDF Format

• Microsoft Word format (use this to enter your own notes/comments and then save for future reference)

How to Participate with the Clearinghouse:

Members of the North Carolina Association of County Commissioners or North Carolina League of Municipalities must complete a series of documents before they can submit debt information to the Clearinghouse.

FORMS:

All forms have been updated for the 2008 Calendar Year. 

OTHER INFORMATION:

Types of Data Allowable:

There is no requirement that participating entities use the Client software application developed by the Clearinghouse. The Clearinghouse allows for two different types of data files which must adhere to a specific layout.

1) Microsoft Excel - view a sample Excel spreadsheet

2) ASCII - view the ASCII file layout documentation.  See Special News note #2 regarding the naming of ASCII files submitted to the Clearinghouse

Compliance Dates:

1) You can send debts to the Clearinghouse even though they have not yet met the due process notification of 30 days. Just put a future Compliance Date that is beyond the 30-day notification requirement.  We will hold these dents until the Compliance Date has passed before we send to the Department of Revenue. Another benefit is that your entity puts a lock on those Social Security Numbers since we time and date stamp debtors as we receive them.  Unless another entity has already sent a particular Social Security Number to us prior to you sending it.

TIP on understanding Compliance Date: it is similar to post dating a check. It is officially not valid and cannot be processed until the date occurs.

REMEMBER: Don't Delete Debtors - Update the Debt Amount to $ 0.00 - send adjustment to the Clearinghouse:

When a debtor pays a debt in full, or they are adjusted for some other reason you must send a $ 0.00 Debt Amount to the Clearinghouse so we can forward this to the North Carolina Department of Revenue. If you just delete the debt, and/or the debtor, the Clearinghouse will never know, nor will the North Carolina Department of Revenue.  Most importantly, the debtor will get a letter from the Department of Revenue stating their tax refund was setoff.  So send the $ 0.00 Debt Amount to the Clearinghouse as soon as possible. The Clearinghouse will forward this adjustment to the Department of Revenue by the following Monday, provided the Clearinghouse receives  the data  by 5:00 PM Friday.

The Client software will not let you delete a debt, it will convert it to $ 0.00.  However, you still have to send the data to the Clearinghouse. Just changing the Debt Amount to $ 0.00 is not enough.  You must complete the entire cycle. Those of you that do not use our software need to be sure you handle this cycle properly.  We all want to avoid unnecessary refunds. Please contact the Clearinghouse if you still have questions.