Spanish-English interchange

Hi we all have a council tax bill at fuengirola town hall for the bin collection for 3 months and has to be payed by may or they charge 20% more but is about 32 euros for a 2 bedroom apt you need to take a copy of your NIE number and passport will do this was told to me last week bye irene/peter

Thanks Irene. There are 2 local taxes which are to be paid to the town hall.

IBI which is local property tax. This is the one I previously advised had not been calculated because the developer had not passed the information required to the town hall. I will get an update on this next week.

There is also a waste collection tax. This is what Irene was refering to and this amount was calculated some time ago.

For both these taxes there is a 5% discount for payment in advance. This applies to payments received before 13th June 2008. The "ordinary payment period" is 14th June to 31st October 2008 and if you opt to pay by direct debit you get the 5% as well. Both these taxes are yearly.

There is a 30% discount available for "citizens registered on the Fuengirola Population Register". As far as I know this is not affected by the timing of your payment but you do have to have been on the register before 1st January 2008. When I went to the town hall I was already registered anyway.

Hi Davmunster

Can you only be on the  "citizens registered on the Fuengirola Population Register" if you are resident in Spain. Who registered for you, was it your solicitor. How does everyone get their bill for this, as I have had no post delivered, and I thought the Town Hall still did not recognise our development yet. Where do we go to pay this bill, and how can we setup a direct debit for this. Is it taken as one payment, or spread throughout the year.

Westport

Hi Westport,

Town Hall funding is based on populatiion figures. One of the problems faced by towns like Fuengirola is that they have a lot of residents using resources who are not registered. This is why they are providing the incentive to register. However I don't know if you have to be tax resident in Spain to register. I will find out.

The Town Hall does recognise our development now and presumably issues bills which we never see because the postman wont deliver them. You can pay online, by DD by post, bank transfer or in person. However as we don't have any bills I think we will all have to go to the town hall at least once. I don't know the pattern of DD payments. Another question for me to ask next week!

 

Hi Westport & Davmunster,

My understanding from contacting the Town hall  is that the Empadronamiento is just a Local Population Register which you can register on if you own a property in Fuengirola - so you don't have to be a resident as such as defined by the tax laws etc.  In order to register call to the Foreign Residents Department (Concejalia de Extranjeros Residentes) at Fuengirola Town Hall, Plaza del Espana, 1 - 3a planta, between 9am to 12.45pm Monday to Friday bringing with you the following documents:

1. Rental Contract or purchase Title Deed (copy will do)
2. Original valid Passport/ID and NIE if you have one,
3. Full address in town (Street name, street number (street number signs are green), name of the building or house, etc.

The inscription fee is €2.20. 

If your property is in joint names then both parties should register.  Hope this helps.

Thanks Gericom for clarifying this. You can get to the town hall by taking the train to Fuengirola, walking 1 block towrds the sea then turning right and walking towards the castle end of town. You can't miss the new town hall it is set behind a nice open area on the right hand side of the road after a few hundred yards.

If you go by car their is an underground car park underneath the open area. Although the sign says "libre" this means there are free spaces not that you don't have to pay

Davmunster - sorry need your help again................

As we will not be in Spain again until August how would we be able to secure the discount  ? - It is a bit of a problem if they need original documents for passport etc

How did you get registered without you realising - Perhaps we are already registered aswell ?

Also I have tried to register onto the electric site and am struggling with the Spanish can someone please advise which parts I should be trying to log into to

Thanks alot

 

 

Hi Mozza,

The 5% discount is for advance payment or direct debit so you should be able to get this if you opt to pay by DD in August. You had to be registered by 1st Jan 2008 to qualify for the 30% according to the council website. We went in March and it was OK so my guess is if you go before 13th June you will probably get the discount - but not after. I don't see how anyone else can register on your behalf. Your passport etc have to match the name of the occupier of the property. However it is worth asking them for it anyway we you go.

Hi Mozza,
The procedure for registering online with Endesa goes like this:
Go to this link:  http://www.endesaonline.com/ES/hogares/oficinaonline/formaltaoficinaonline1.asp

Choose option "Soy propietario de viviendas" and click on Aceptar
On the next page in Empresa select Sevillana
In Contrato put in the number of your Sevillana contract probably 11 numbers starting with 9703 if it's like mine
In the next line put in the number of your last bill, which is about 16 characters starting with 00S in my case
Under "Datos del Titular del Contrato"
Nombre is your surname (the name on your contract)
Apellido 1 &2 are your first and second names
Tipo de Documento : choose Passport
No. de documento is your passport number
Telefono de contacto: Telephone number in Spain (obligatory)
Email:  your email address, also obligatory
Then you type in a user name, min. 6 characters
Then a password, again min. 6 characters
Then repeat your password
Leave next option at "No"
Click on box to accept the terms (He leido Acepto los terminos legales)
Then click on Aceptar

I think that is the end of the process - you should get an email confirming your registration after a day or two. 
As you can see, in order to get through this process you need to have some information from your last bill and I think a Spanish telephone number - I'm nearly sure that it won't accept an international number.

Hope this helps

Thanks for your help Gericom/Davmunster much appreciated

Problem - How do I get a Spanish telephone number ?

Hi Mozza,

I just purchased a Spanish sim card and a cheap mobile to go with it on the Happy Movil service - you cam get them at PhoneHouse shops.

Hi gericomm

Where are the phoneHouse shops. Is there one near Don Juan, or the miramar shopping centre, or along the beach front. Do we have to have our UK mobile unlocked first, to use a Spanish Sim card.

I am about to send you a private mail, so check your inbox.

Westport

Hi Westport,

The Phone House shop we used is in the Myramar Parque where AKI and Boulanger etc are located, however there is also one in the Myramar shopping centre itself.  Yes if you want to use your own phone it will have to be unlocked but we bought 2 new cheap models for the Spanish sims - we can communicate in Spain cheaply then and with Happy Movil the rate for calling home to a fixed line Ireland/UK is .058 cents per minute. There is a connection charge of 0.36 cents and IVA of 16% on top of these.  We chose Happy Movil because an English customer in the shop recommended them for cheap international calls.  Strangely though, International texts cost 0.45cents + IVA.

The result of the above of course is that we are often carrying around 2 phones which can be a bit of a drawback....

Be warned the vouchers for mobiles are time limited. There is quite a long life span - approx 6 months - but good idea not to buy too much airtime if you're not going to be using it.

I went to the town hall today. The 31.85€ Irene refered to is actually for refuse collection in 2007! The 2008 taxes have not yet been calculated. They are nearly ready and I will go back next week to see if they are

I (and other neighbours) are not willing to pay for the 2007 bills as the garbage was not yet collected then. The town hall understood our position and will look into it.

Hi i did say it was for the collection of the bins but i did think this was for january till march collection bye irene /peter

We arrived this week to find 2 council tax bills in our mail box. These are for the 2008 taxes. These show an amount due for refuse collection of 66.90 and another amount of 241.63 for  whatever else the council does. Both these amounts are reduced by 5% if you pay  by 13th June or if you set up direct debits to pay them. The direct debits are collected in July. The  Valor Catastral valuation which  is used to calculate  wealth tax and rental tax is 74,827.21. We have a 2 bed apt so the amount for 1 or 3 bed apartments may be more or less. 
You can be put on  the "population register" even f you don't live in Spain provided you have title deeds to your apartment and a NIE No. This will get you 30% discount off this amount next year but you cannot obtain more than the 5% discount off this years taxes unless you registered in 2007.

Below is a copy of a message from the town hall relating to the charge for bin collection in  2007. It seems we do not have to pay as we didn't have our bins emptied. I suggest if you have already paid this you take your receipt and a copy of this message to the town hall for a refund.
2008 taxes are due and my previous posts in relation to this still apply 

ASUNTO: ANULACIÓN DE LOS RECIBOS DE BASURA DEL 2007

 

 

TRAS DIVERSAS GESTIONES CON LA AGENCIA DE RECAUDACIÓN DEL AYUNTAMIENTO DE FUENGIROLA SE HAN CONSEGUIDO ANULAR LAS TASAS DE TRANSPORTE Y TRATAMIENTO DE BASURAS CORRESPONDIENTES AL AÑO 2007 PARA LA RESIDENCIAL DON JUAN 1.

LA RAZÓN ES QUE LA ISLA ECOLÓGICA NO ENTRÓ EN FUNCIONAMIENTO HASTA, AL  MENOS, ENERO DE 2008.

 

AQUELLOS PROPIETARIOS QUE YA HUBIESEN PAGADO DICHO RECIBO PUEDEN DIRIGIRSE AL AYUNTAMIENTO PARA RECLAMAR SU DEVOLUCIÓN.

 

EL RECIBO CORRESPONDIENTE AL AÑO 2008 YA ESTÁ AL COBRO, Y ESTE SÍ QUE HAY QUE ABONARLO.

 

 -------------------------

Aprovecho y te adjunto la información sobre los trasteros

 

DISTRIBUCIÓN DE TRASTEROS EN LA URBANIZACIÓN  D. JUAN 1

Thanks to Javier (a member of our committee) who worked hard to produce these papers. I met him this morning in the townhall today and he showed me the official statement that the 'ecological islands' as they are called here were only operational from mid january on.

The last part is about the trasteros (the storage rooms) and I will cover that in 'Community matters'