Kokua Line: Honolulu County lets eligible property owners spread out payments for Aug. 20 tax bill due to COVID-19
Question: We did not receive a Honolulu County property tax bill due Aug. 20. How do we get a copy, especially with City Hall closed due to COVID?
Answer: You can request a bill from the city (details below), or you can look up how much you owe online, then pay online, over the phone (with a credit card), by mail or in person. Although Honolulu Hale is largely closed to the public due to a cluster of COVID-19 cases among city employees, real property tax payments will continue to be accepted, according to the city.
Before making a payment, confirm that you actually owe the tax, and that it is not paid on your behalf through an escrow account, as is common for mortgage holders. If you’re sure that you should have received a tax bill, you can email the city’s Treasury Division at bfstreasmailbox@honolulu.gov or call 768-3980 to request one.
As we mentioned, you also can look up your tax bill online. Go to realpropertyhonolulu.com and click on “Property Records Search.” Find your property by address, parcel number (TMK), or map. Once you locate your property report, scroll down the page to “Current Tax Bill Information,” where you should see the amount due, plus links to pay online or by other methods (“other payment options”).
If you had received your tax bill in the mail, you also would have received a letter explaining that taxpayers having financial trouble because of the pandemic may split the total amount due on Aug. 20 into four equal payments, due Aug. 20, Sept. 20, Oct. 20 and Nov. 18. For more information about the installment plan, read the letter at 808ne.ws/covidletter or contact the Treasury Division as previously described.
Q: Will the Board of Water Supply test all its employees now? It’s already had three test positive but didn’t test everybody right away.
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A: The semiautonomous city agency will offer voluntary COVID-19 testing to its employees, spokeswoman Kathleen Elliott-Pahinui said Monday. So yes, employees who want to be tested will be.
This is an update from Thursday, when the Board of Water Supply said that mass testing was not being offered because such testing was up to each employee and their personal physician or the state Department of Health.
As of Monday, the number of cases remained at three, she said.
Anyone tested for COVID-19 must self- quarantine at home until they receive their test result, assuming that it is negative.
Q: A friend in Japan was supposed to mail me a package but never did. She said she couldn’t because mail to the United States was suspended. Could that be true?
A. Yes, if she tried to send it via Japan Post, the country’s national postal service, which has suspended airmail package deliveries to the United States since early in the pandemic.
As of Aug. 7, the United States was among 154 countries or territories to which Japan Post continued to suspend all or some mail delivery, according to an update on Japan Post’s website. Its mail delivery to the United States was first disrupted in April.
Regarding airmail to the United States, “only some letter-post items such as letters, postcards and mail for the blind by air are accepted,” according to a footnote in the announcement, which you can read at 808ne.ws/japanpost. Surface mail (by ship) to the United States also is accepted, it said.
Japan Post blames the pandemic-era reduction in flights to and from Japan for the disruption. Even airmail to the United States that Japan Post accepts for delivery, such as letters and postcards, is significantly delayed, it said.
Write to Kokua Line at Honolulu Star-Advertiser, 7 Waterfront Plaza, Suite 210, 500 Ala Moana Blvd., Honolulu 96813; call 529-4773; fax 529-4750; or email kokualine@staradvertiser.com.