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DOC's half a million dollar stuff up signals incompetence
DOC's half a million dollar stuff up signals incompetence
The Taxpayers' Union is slamming the incompetence of the Department of Conservation, which, as reported by NBR this morning, lost out on $440k worth of fees on Great Walk huts, after failing to charge international schools for over a decade.
In 2007, Labour decided to waive fees for children staying in the Great Walk huts, but missed a loophole which meant international students stayed for free, when they should have been paying the full rate. DOC have missed out on $440k of fees as a result of the lost opportunity.
Executive Director Jordan Williams says, "This appears to be a classic ‘Yes Minister’ stuff up, which only a team of bureaucrats could pull off. What business wouldn’t notice they are undercharging seven percent of their custom in a few days, little own nine years?”
“DOC nearly deserve an award for this example incompetence.”
“Ironically, at the very time we learn officials are failing to enforce existing charges for tourists, some political parties want to hike those charges and create various new taxes on tourism. It would seem a lot easier to simply fix DOC’s ability to actually collect the existing charges.”
ENDS
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