Property Tax Refund Homestead File (Homestead-PTR File) Submission Instructions

Transcription

1 Property Tax Refund Homestead File (Homestead-PTR File) Submission Instructions Section I: Section II: Section III: Section IV: Section V: Section VI: Important Notes Submission Process Submitting Files for Certification Transferring the Production File Common Transmission Errors Contact Information Section I Important Notes All Homestead-PTR file submissions must be compressed (zipped). The EDE system will reject non-compressed files. Do not password protect the zipped files. The Homestead-PTR files are very large. Due to upload times and server storage space constraints, it benefits the counties and the Department of Revenue to work with compressed files only. Large files may be broken into multiple smaller files for ease of submission. If you break your files into multiple smaller files for submission, please indicate this in the Comments field on the Electronic Data Exchange (EDE) submission webpage, including total number of files submitted (Example: File 1 of 4 ). For 2018, please note that files will not be accepted prior to March 1st. The Department is developing improvements to the internal processes related to these files and will not be prepared to accept files prior to this date. The Homestead File-PTR is due on April 30, Use the same EDE user id and password that is used to submit other property tax submissions. Section II Submission Process What is Certification vs. Production? It is not necessary to submit your file through certification before submitting your file through production. Certification is the process of checking the file to ensure that it meets requirements. This file is NOT saved by the system. Production refers to the actual transmission of the complete file that will be saved and used by the Department of Revenue for the intended purposes (i.e. the file used in production ).

2 Certification performs the following validation checks: Malware Check: o Verifies there are no viruses embedded in the file Check for Well Formed XML document: o Verifies that all the XML element tags match o Verifies that each begin-tag has a matching end-tag XML Schema Validation o Verifies that required fields are not omitted o Verifies that the data types for each element are correct o Verifies that the placement and order of the elements are correct Business Rule(s) Check o Verifies that the file contains data for the correct assessment year o (May add additional business rule checks in future years) Section III Submitting Files for Certification Prior to submitting the final Homestead-PTR File to the Department of Revenue s EDE production server, a test file may be submitted to the certification site. The certification site is a validation site only; data is not saved to the server. The certification site is used to validate the homestead file for XML schema validation. If the schema validates, the complete file may then be submitted into production. Certification Sample File vs. Complete File Transmitting a complete file for certification can be time consuming and may not be necessary. Most errors can probably be identified in a sample file. Therefore, a county may want to consider submitting a sample file (containing perhaps 500 records) from its Homestead-PTR File instead of the complete file to the certification site. However, be aware that it only takes one error to cause a file to fail to validate. Therefore, if a county chooses to submit a sample certification file, the production file may fail validation if it contains a single error that was not in the sample file. Regardless of whether a sample or complete file is submitted for certification, all files must be compressed (zipped). Certification Site The certification site s url is: (Note that you will be redirected to the secure site. This is the validation site ONLY. Data is not saved.)

3 Instructions for Submitting the Certification File The following instructions illustrate the procedures for submitting the certification file. When you enter the certification site, you will be prompted for your user id and password as shown in the screen below. Log in to the certification site using the user id and password that your county uses for other Property Tax EDE data submissions. If you do not know your user id or if you have forgotten your password, please see Section VI for contact information. After you have logged into the certification site, the following screen will display. Click on the Transmit a file link.

4 The Transmit a file screen will display. Choose Homestead Files-PTR Test Only by clicking on the down arrow on the Transmission type box. Click on the browse button to select the file you will be submitting. Please enter your contact information in the Comments box in case we have questions concerning your file.

5 Click on the Upload button. Note: Upload times vary dramatically (from minutes to hours) depending on the size of the file, your network connection (T1 vs. dial-up vs. DSL vs. high speed cable), and the number of uploads being processed simultaneously at the site. After the upload is complete, the Transmission status screen will display. This verifies that the file has been received, however, you will need to check the transmission history (as described below) to see the results of the validation processing. Please allow 24 hours for processing. The Transmission status screen lists: the tracking id for the file you submitted

6 the date and time the file was submitted the type of file submitted and the file name Print the Transmission status page as this information is necessary for checking the file validation status.

7 Checking File Validation Status To check the status of your submission, you need to be logged in to the EDE certification system. Once you are logged in, click on the View transmission history link. The Transmission history screen will display. Check the File status that corresponds to the Tracking ID that was returned to you when you uploaded the file. The possible file status indicators are: Received the file has been received and is awaiting processing In Process the file is currently in the validation process Rejected the file failed to pass the validation process indicating that one or more errors in the file need to be resolved Completed the file successfully passed the validation process and can now be submitted to the production site

8 Clicking on these indicators will display an Acknowledgment screen similar to the following: If the certification file passed validation, proceed to Section IV for instructions on submitting the production file. In this example, the Status indicates that the file has been rejected and an error message is displayed. See Section V for the most common error messages and resolutions. After the error(s) have been corrected, repeat this process until the file validates successfully (Status = Accepted). Section IV Transferring the Production File After a file has successfully passed validation on the certification site, the complete file may be uploaded to the production site. Production Site The production site s url is: (This is the production site. Data is saved.) Instructions for Submitting the Production File The instructions for submitting the production file are the same as the certification file submission procedure. When you enter the production site, you will be prompted for your user id and password.

9 After you are logged into the EDE site: 1) Click on the Transmit a file link 2) Choose Homestead File-PTR from the drop down Transmission Type box 3) Click on the Browse button to select the file you will be submitting 4) Enter your contact information in the Comments box (in case we have questions about your file). 5) Click the Upload button. 6) Print the Transmission status screen. 7) Check the status of the submission. Section V: Common Types of Transmission Errors The following are some common types of transmissions errors. Mal-Formed XML An error message will display if the XML document is not well-formed. The most common error may occur when an element is not wrapped by both the beginning and end tags. Error found on line:74. XML document structures must start and end with the same entity. For example, the following shows a missing end tag for the element PersonName. <TaxStatementName> <PersonName> <u:personsurname>johnson</u:personsurname> <u:persongivenname>paul</u:persongivenname> <u:personmiddlename>milton</u:personmiddlename> </TaxStatementName> Another example of mal-formed XML may include providing child elements without their parent (i.e. providing a leaf element without the branch ). Namespace Omitted If you do not include the correct namespaces in the beginning of the file, you will receive an error referring to a prefix not being bound. Error found on line:3. The prefix mnr-ptx for element mnr-ptx:homesteaddocumenttype Code is not bound.

10 In the above example, the prefix mnr-ptx was not defined and this was first encountered with the element named HomesteadDocumentTypeCode. Below are the correct namespace definitions that should be included at the beginning of the file. <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <HomesteadRecordsDocument xmlns:mn=" xmlns:c=" xmlns:u=" xmlns:mnr-ptx=" xmlns:xsi=" Missing Required Element Failing to provide a required element will also generate an error. In the example below, the required element PersonSurName is missing. Error found on line:9. cvc-complex-type.2.4.a: Invalid content was found starting with element u:persongivenname. One of { :PersonSurName} is expected. <TaxStatementName> <PersonName> <u:persongivenname>paul</u:persongivenname> <u:personmiddlename>milton</u:personmiddlename> </PersonName> </TaxStatementName> Missing Data in Element If an element s tags are provided but the data is missing, an error message will also be displayed. In this example, the top line shows the correct inclusion of the element s data, but the bottom line would trigger an error since the data is missing. Error found on line:5. cvc-datatype-valid.1.2.1: '' is not a valid value for 'PersonGivenName'. Error found on line:5. cvc-type.3.1.3: The value '' of element 'u:persongivenname' is not valid. <u:persongivenname>paul</u:persongivenname> <u:persongivenname></u:persongivenname> Invalid Enumerations, or Values, for Elements with Defined Choices Certain elements have a set list of allowable values, or specific enumerations.

11 For example, the HomesteadDocumentTypeCode is an element that identifies which file is being represented and this element can have one of four values: property-taxrefund-manufactured-home, property-tax-refund-real-personal, duplicate-homesteadmanufactured-home or duplicate-homestead-real-personal. If some other value (for example: another-code ) is being supplied then an error message will be generated as follows: Error found on line:3. cvc-enumeration-valid: Value anothercode is not facet-valid with respect to enumeration [property-tax-refund, duplicate-homestead]. It must be a value from the enumeration. Error found on line:3. cvc-type.3.1.3: The value anothercode of element mnr-ptx:homesteaddocumenttypecode is not valid. <mnr-ptx:homesteaddocumenttypecode>another-code</mnrptx:homesteaddocumenttypecode> Another example is the element HomesteadTypeCode which can only contain the values: non-agricultural, manufactured-home, actively-farming, and agricultural. Providing the value residential would yield the following error message: Error found on line:17. cvc-enumeration-valid: Value residential is not facet-valid with respect to enumeration [non-agricultural, manufacture-home, actively-farming, agricultural]. It must be a value from the enumeration. Error found on line:17. cvc-type.3.1.3: The value residential of element mnr-ptx:homesteadtypecode is not valid. <mnr-ptx:homesteadtypecode>residential</mnr-ptx:homesteadtypecode> Non UTF-8 Characters Only 8 bit ASCII UTF characters are allowed in the file transmissions. Certain characters may appear in your data values that are non-utf characters and may cause the file to fail validation. For example, smart quotes ( ), paragraph marks ( ), boxes ( ), or any other non-ascii characters may cause an error. (Currently, the validation is somewhat lenient on non-utf characters but this will change in the future. No error message will be displayed in the upload process but can be seen in other tools such as XMLSpy.) <u:persongivenname>paul Paullie </u:persongivenname> Escape Characters

12 The following five characters are XML escape characters and if they are contained within the value of an element they will cause the file to fail validation: & (ampersand) < (less than) > (greater than) (single quote) (double quote) Error found on line:11. The entity name must immediately follow the & in the entity reference. Incorrect: <u:persongivenname>paul & Mary</u:PersonGivenName> Correct: <u:persongivenname>paul and Mary</u:PersonGivenName> Correct: <u:persongivenname>paul & Mary</u:PersonGivenName> Invalid Decimal Characters If a capital letter O were provided for an element that is expecting a numeric or decimal value, this would yield an error message: Error found on line:51. cvc-datatype-valid.1.2.1: 50O is not a valid value for decimal. Error found on line:51. cvc-type.3.1.3: The value 50O of element mn:parcelimprovementamount is not a valid. In this case the second zero in 500 is a capital O. <mn:parcelimprovementamount>50o</mn:parcelimprovementamount> Single Property Values and Tax If the cardinality in the schema calls for an exact number of elements, a value must be entered even if the data does not exist. For example, the homestead XML schema calls for exactly two property values and taxes for the current and prior year.

13 If prior year values do not exist, the data elements for the prior year must be reported and the value set to zero. A missing element would yield the following error message: Error found on line:57. cvc-complex-type.2.4.a:invalid content was found starting with element mnrptx:propertytaxcurrentyearqualifyingtaxamount. One of the { :PropertyValuesAndTax} is expected. The XML schema is checking for the second <PropertyValuesAndTax> but cannot find it. Incorrect PropertyTaxAssessmentYear A check is performed to verify that the Property Tax Assessment Year is reported correctly. (For the Homestead-PTR file, this value should be 2017 and for the Homestead-Dup file, this value should be 2018.) An incorrect year would yield the following error message: Error found on line:5. PropertyTaxAssessmentYear, 2015 does not equal prior year. <mnr-ptx:propertytaxassessmentyear>2015</mnrptx:propertytaxassessmentyear> Missing PropertyTaxAssessmentYear The PropertyTaxAssessmentYear must contain a value. A missing or invalid PropertyTaxAssessmentYear would yield the following error messages: Error found on line:5. cvc-dataype-valid.1.2.1: is not a valid value for gyear. Error found on line:5. cvd-type.3.1.3:the value of element mnr-ptx:propertytaxassessmentyear is not valid.

14 Error found on line:5.propertytaxassessmentyear must be numeric and equal to prior year. <mnr-ptx:propertytaxassessmentyear></mnr-ptx:propertytaxassessmentyear> gyear means a Gregorian Year based on the Gregorian Calendar system Section VI: Contact Information the Property Tax Division EDE Support Unit proptax.ede@state.mn.us for the following issues: Forgotten user id Forgotten password Account is locked Request a user id be sure to include your name, title and county be sure to include your user id be sure to include your user id be sure to include your name, title, county, address, telephone number and the office (assessor or auditor) you represent. Questions about the homestead file homestead.match@state.mn.us