Penalty Waiver/Refund Request

• Did not receive a notice or bill
• Forgot to file and/or pay
• Not knowing Personal Identification Number (PIN) or Location Identification Number (LIN)
• First late payment
• Responsible person is no longer with the company
• Payment arrived after delinquent date with no postmark from US Postal Service
• Confused by bill, unsure of what to pay
• Can’t afford tax payment

• Failure to make a timely payment is due to reasonable cause and circumstances beyond the taxpayer's control, and occurred notwithstanding the exercise of ordinary care in the absence of willful neglect; or
• There was an inadvertent error in the payment amount made by the taxpayer, and payment for the proper amount due is made within 10 days.

If you paid more than once, or overpaid your property tax bill, your refund will be processed automatically in the order it is received. You do not need to take any additional action. Please allow up to four months for processing and be assured every effort will be made to process the refund as quickly as possible.

We encourage taxpayers to provide any documentation supporting their waiver request.  You will have an opportunity to upload your supporting documents during the DocuSign process at the end of the application. The total of all attachments may not exceed 25MB.

Waiver requests are processed in the order that they are received. Normal processing time is approximately six weeks, but may be longer after tax deadlines. Unpaid balances will continue to accrue additional penalties and interest which are the responsibility of the tax payers should  the waiver request be denied. 

We encourage taxpayers to provide any documentation supporting their waiver request.  You will have an opportunity to upload your supporting documents during the DocuSign process at the end of the application. The total of all attachments may not exceed 25MB.

The Office will contact you by mail with a final decision. If you do not agree with the decision, you may be entitled to file a claim with the Office of the City Attorney. The forms are available online at http://www.sfcityattorney.org.

If your request is granted and you have an overpayment on your account, we will automatically process a refund. You do not need to take further action.

Penalty waivers for permit and license fees must be approved by the regulatory agency (e.g. Public Health, Entertainment, Fire, Police, etc). If you submit a request through this site, our Office will route the request to the regulatory agency for their response. Some requests must also be approved by our Bureau of Delinquent Revenue (BDR). Requests are reviewed by the regulatory agency. Allow 12 weeks before contacting the regulatory agency for an update.

License obligations are generally comprised of different fees depending on the type or level of delinquency. A partial approval could mean that some (but not all) of the full amount was approved to be waived.

We encourage taxpayers to provide any documentation supporting their waiver request.  You will have an opportunity to upload your supporting documents during the DocuSign process at the end of the application. The total of all attachments may not exceed 25MB.

If your waiver request is approved, allow up to six weeks for a refund.

To follow up on a request, or get more information about your case, contact the regulatory agency as listed below.