Resident Info

Rates in Alice Springs

Alice Springs Town Coun­cil pro­vides and main­tains a com­pre­hen­sive range of recre­ation­al, cul­tur­al, envi­ron­men­tal, human­i­tar­i­an ser­vices and facilities.

About 60 per­cent of the mon­ey need­ed to pro­vide these ser­vices comes from rates levied on prop­er­ties in Alice Springs.

Coun­cil aims to keep rates as low as pos­si­ble. Con­sid­er­ing our small pop­u­la­tion and the extra expense involved in acquir­ing goods and ser­vices in the cen­tre of Aus­tralia, Coun­cil rates com­pare favourably with those charged by many oth­er coun­cils around the country.

For the cur­rent rates brochure, click here.

Many of Coun­cil’s ratepay­ers have request­ed that Coun­cil con­tact them via email in addi­tion to phys­i­cal mail.

Enter your details below to receive email reminders about upcom­ing rate instalments.

Rates Email Reminder

Gen­er­al Rates

The Gen­er­al Rates are cal­cu­lat­ed by mul­ti­ply­ing the Unim­proved Cap­i­tal Val­ue of each par­cel of land by the declared rate set by Council.

If this results in an amount less than the min­i­mum amount payable, as set by Coun­cil, then the min­i­mum amount payable will apply.

The Unim­proved Cap­i­tal Val­ue of land used by Town Coun­cil is pro­vid­ed by the Val­uer General.

The Unim­proved Cap­i­tal Val­ue is the val­ue of the land with­out any improve­ments, that is, a vacant block with­out build­ings, fences, etc.

Val­u­a­tions are updat­ed every three years. Fluc­tu­a­tions in val­u­a­tions cause shifts in the amount of rates paid by indi­vid­ual ratepay­ers in var­i­ous areas of the town.

Basi­cal­ly, the peo­ple with the most valu­able land pay high­er rates.

If you have any queries regard­ing the val­u­a­tion of your prop­er­ty, these should be direct­ed to the Val­uer General’s Office, tele­phone (08) 8943 9193.

Pay­ment of Rates

Rates are payable by instal­ments. Rates and charges for each finan­cial year (1 July to 30 June) are due and payable by four instalments.

Reminders of the due dates are adver­tised in the local media. Ratepay­ers may choose to pay the full amount of the rates and charges for the year by the first due date. Pay­ment of your full annu­al rates and charges (and any arrears) by the first instal­ment date and you could win a rates refund!

The Ear­ly Bird Draw applies only to indi­vid­u­als (being a nat­ur­al per­son, not com­pa­nies, gov­ern­ment bod­ies, or incor­po­rat­ed bod­ies), who are entered in the Ear­ly Bird Draw to win a refund on their rates (not exceed­ing $3,000). The refund does not include the cost of waste man­age­ment charges. Entry is auto­mat­ic with full pay­ment before the first instal­ment date and win­ners are adver­tised in the local media.

There are penal­ties for late payments

If your rate pay­ment is not received by the due date the account will be in arrears.

Penal­ties for late pay­ment on the out­stand­ing instal­ment will be cal­cu­lat­ed on a dai­ly basis from the date on which the missed instal­ment was due until the date pay­ment is made in full.

Penal­ties for late pay­ments are charged at a set per­cent­age per annum.

If you are hav­ing dif­fi­cul­ty in mak­ing the required pay­ment by the due date, please con­tact the Rates Office on (08) 8950 0500.

Due Dates

The due dates for the 2019/2020 finan­cial year are as follows:

First Instal­ment – 06/09/2019

Sec­ond Instal­ment – 01/11/2019

Third Instal­ment – 07/02/2020

Fourth Instal­ment – 03/04/2020

More infor­ma­tion about Rates for the cur­rent year is avail­able in the Rates Dec­la­ra­tion 2019 – 2020.

Ways to Pay your Rates

BPAY View: Log into your online bank­ing and reg­is­ter for BPAY View. Infor­ma­tion regard­ing how to reg­is­ter can be found on your rates notice, and is also avail­able from our BPAY View page. For more infor­ma­tion regard­ing BPAY View, vis­it the offi­cial BPay View website.

Online Pay­ments: Click here and fol­low the links to make a payment.

In Per­son: Make your pay­ment at the Civic Cen­tre from 8am to 5pm week­days by cheque, cash, Mas­ter­Card or Visa.

By Mail: Post a cheque or mon­ey order with your deposit slip, or com­plete your Mas­ter­Card or Visa details on your deposit slip, to Coun­cil at PO Box 1071, Alice Springs NT 0871. Mail pay­ments must be received on or before the due date to avoid a penal­ty for late payment.

By Phone: Phone 1300 437 967 with your Mas­ter­Card or Visa details.

By BPAY: Con­tact your par­tic­i­pat­ing bank to pay direct­ly from your cheque, sav­ings or cred­it card account. Quote the biller code and ref­er­ence num­ber as indi­cat­ed by the BPAY logo on your rates notice.

By Direct Deb­it: Com­plete an appli­ca­tion form which is avail­able from the Civic Cen­tre or down­load from our forms page. Coun­cil can then draw on your cheque or sav­ings account on the dates rates are due.

By Pay­roll Deduc­tion: Employ­ees of the NT Gov­ern­ment and some oth­er organ­i­sa­tions can pay their rates through reg­u­lar pay­roll deductions.

Please Note: Ratepay­ers remain respon­si­ble for ensur­ing pay­ments are made in full by the instal­ment due dates. Please ensure cor­rect ref­er­ence details are used when mak­ing pay­ment — fail­ure to do so may incur a charge.

If you believe you will have dif­fi­cul­ty mak­ing the required pay­ment by the due date, please con­tact the Rate­sOf­fi­cer on 8950 0500.

Noti­fi­ca­tion of man­ag­ing agent: Com­mer­cial or Residential

If you are the prin­ci­pal ratepay­er for a prop­er­ty with­in the Coun­cil munic­i­pal­i­ty but you have instruct­ed a real estate agent to man­age your prop­er­ty on your behalf, you will have to com­plete this form to noti­fy Coun­cil of the postal address of the agent for the pur­pose of any deal­ings with the prop­er­ty’s issue of rates notices. Use this form in con­junc­tion with the form titled ​‘addi­tion­al list of man­aged prop­er­ties and change of address’.

Noti­fi­ca­tion of Man­ag­ing Agent can be down­loaded here.

Change of Address

Avoid any prob­lems by remem­ber­ing to noti­fy Coun­cil when chang­ing your address.

The Local Gov­ern­ment Act requires ratepay­ers to noti­fy Coun­cil in writ­ing of any change of mail­ing address with­in 28 days.

A penal­ty of $3,080.00 for not doing so may apply. The form is on our Forms page.

Con­ces­sion for Pensioners

Aged Pen­sion­ers are enti­tled to a con­ces­sion on their rates.

Con­ces­sions for eli­gi­ble pen­sion­ers are auto­mat­i­cal­ly includ­ed in their assess­ment on the rates notice.

Enquiries regard­ing your eli­gi­bil­i­ty for pen­sion­er con­ces­sions on rates and rebates for part-year eli­gi­bil­i­ty should be direct­ed to the North­ern Ter­ri­to­ry Pen­sion­er and Car­er Con­ces­sion Scheme, please con­tact the Pen­sion­er Con­ces­sion Unit on 1800 777 704 or email at PensionConcessionUnit@​nt.​gov.​au