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HB 0843 from the 2011 Texas legislative session allows for tax bills to be delivered electronically . ACT has developed a way for taxpayers to register to receive the 2012 tax statement by signing up on your tax office web site. The statements that will be emailed will be in the format used by each tax office on the Online Product screen in the Tax Collection System. Statements can be sent for individual accounts or for a group of accounts in a portfolio (not a locked portfolio, but the accounts listed after the user logs in to a portfolio).

The person registering to receive the statement must verify that he/she is the owner of the property or group of properties (a portfolio). Two emails are sent, one following the initial entry of name, address, email address, etc. that asks the taxpayer to verify the email by clicking a link that is provided. The second email is sent after the taxpayer clicks that link and ACT updates the database with this registration information. If the taxpayer does not verify the email address by clicking the link in the first email, no statement will be emailed to that account. Taxpayers can register more than once, but the statement will be emailed only once. The deadline for registering each year is September 15.

When certified statements are ready to be printed, the accounts to be sent statements by email can be withheld from the data file sent to the printers. A link to the.pdf file of the statement will be added to an email, which will then be sent to each owner who registered to receive these statements electronically. E-statements will not be created unless receivables exist for that account and year.

Client Preferences

EMAIL_ADDR_OF_E-STMT_SUBMITTER: Enter the email address to use as the 'From' address for the two emails mentioned above. This does not need to be a valid address unless your tax office wants to track which e-mails bounce back (i.e., fail to reach the recipient).

E-STMT_EMAIL_DO_NOT_REPLY: If this is set to Y,a DO NOT REPLY TO THIS E-MAIL message appears on the emails sent to each taxpayer. If it is set to N, then the DO NOT REPLY will not appear.

E_STMT_BEGIN_YEAR: Enter the next tax year for taxpayers to begin receiving statements by email. The deadline for registering each year is September 15. After that date, you must change the year in this preference to the next tax year. For ex., on September 20, 2012, you are no longer eligible to register to receive 2012 certified statements by e-mail and this preference should be set to 2013. This preference must be set to a year later than the year in the preference INTERNET_CURR_YEAR to show the registration link on the web site.

STMT_IMAGE_URL: This must be set to the directory path used for storing the e-mailed statement pdf files for retrieval on the E-Statement screen. The default path is https://actweb.acttax.com/act_images/statements/[client]/, where 'client' is the name of the directory to be created if it does not already exist.

CPA: Enter the name of the tax assessor-collector

CPA_TITLE: Enter the job title for the person named in the CPA preference

JUR_ADDRESS1: Enter the name of the tax office (do not include the words 'tax office')

JUR_ADDRESS2: Enter the street address of the tax office

JUR_ADDRESS3: If needed, continue the street address

JUR_ADDRESS4: Enter the city, state and zip code for the tax office

JUR_PHONE: Enter the phone number to put on the e-mails sent to registrants

Dallas County only:

EMAIL_STATEMENT_FROM:Enter the email address to use as the 'From' address for e-statement requests.

EMAIL_STATEMENT_REJECT_SUBJECT:Enter the email subject line for rejected e-statement notifications.

EMAIL_STATEMENT_REJECT_TO:Enter the email address to use as 'To' address for rejected e-statement notifications.

EMAIL_STATEMENT_REQUEST_ENABLE:Show the button to allow e-statement registration.

ESTATEMENT_APPROVE_GROUP: Email address for email statement request review action report (an internal tax office activity).

ESTATEMENT_PHONE_DISPLAY: Enter Yes to show the phone no. for e-statement registration. Enter No to hide the phone field.

ESTATEMENT_PHONE_REQUIRED: Enter Yes to require the phone no. for e-statement registration. Enter No to not require this.

ESTATEMENT_URL_PREFIX:URL prefix for ADF PublicTAX application server. Contact ACT for assistance with this preference.

ESTATEMENT_LOCATION: Location where java files are located that will retrieve and display a PDF tax statement

To register for electronic statements, taxpayers should do the following:

1. Go to your tax office web site. The URL might be something like this, with your tax office name: http://actweb.acttax.com/act_webdev/<tax office name>/index.jsp
2. Search for an account or log in to your portfolio.
3. If you search for a single account, the hyperlink to begin registering is typically at the bottom right of the Property Tax Balance page. If you log in to a portfolio, the accounts listed on the page titled 'Your Portfolio Tax Accounts' will be flagged as eligible to receive a statement by e-mail.
4. After filling in the information on the Registration page, click the Register button at the bottom.
5. An email will be sent to the email address provided on the Registration page.
6. The taxpayer will click a link provided in the body of the e-mail. ACT's database will be updated with the registration information and the taxpayer will receive a second email confirming the registration.
7. You can see the requests in the E-Statement screen, which shows accounts, email addresses, the date the statement was emailed, and the actual statement itself. Requests can be expired there, and a bad email address can also be indicated.
8. Before creating the data file for the print vendor, you must run batch menu no. 1346, Create Fiduciary Requests for E-Statements. The fiduciary used must have an 'ES' type.
9. You have the option of including or excluding these accounts from the printing vendor's file. (This is done on the statement wizard by selecting 'Statements' for group 5 to include the accounts.) If you are not using the statement wizard, one option to prevent statements from printing is to set the ES fiduciary to have a Processing Option for certified roll of Tape to Tape in the Fiduciary Master screen.
10. When certified statements are ready to be emailed, run batch menu no. 1646, PDF Statements for E-Mailing, which creates emails containing links to statements for all accounts that requested e-statements during the most recent year and all prior years.If you want to attach additional documents that you have uploaded, list them in the Names of Extra Files field (separated by commas).