An error with some Bartholomew County tax bills could be causing confusion about whether or not your property taxes are being paid through an escrow account.

According to County Treasurer Barb Hackman, because of a problem with a data file, thousands of property tax bills were issued with incorrect information about whether the taxpayer or their bank is responsible for the tax payments.

Normally, tax bills paid through escrow accounts will come with a watermark saying that the bill is for informational purposes only. Behind the scenes, the same code that produces the watermark also sends the tax bill to the escrow processing company for payment. Hackman said that the header code was left off of the data file for one of the nation’s largest escrow account processing companies. In Bartholomew County, that meant more than 8,000incorrect billings.

When tax bills started hitting mailboxes after they were mailed last week, the calls started coming in from residents who were being told they were responsible for the tax payments themselves.

Hackman said that the problem has been corrected, the incorrect file field has been updated and the bills should be paid correctly out of the escrow account. However, corrected tax bills will not be resent, she said.

If you have any questions, she says you can call the treasurer’s office for assistance.