A temporary closure to the Cross Roads Tax Office in St Andrew since Monday, due to indoor air quality issues, led to chaos at the downtown Kingston branch as people used that location to complete transactions so they could return to work and other personal business.

The Jamaica Observer received complaints from citizens on Wednesday of increased traffic at the downtown office as a result of the closure of the Cross Roads location.

When the Observer visited the Cross Roads Tax Office on Wednesday morning our team was met by two security guards at the entrance of the building. The message delivered by one of them was “We are closed. Inside, they have some technical problems and they are dealing with it, so Monday before they reopen”. Dozens of people were met with disappointment as the security guards delivered a similar message to them.

One man told the Observer that the circumstances were inconvenient for him and said the Tax Administration of Jamaica (TAJ) should have given the public adequate warning or notification about the situation.

“This has inconvenienced me extremely. At least dem coulda put out an advertisement or something to tell people. I came here to sort out my car papers but now I have to head for the Constant Spring office,” he said in a tone of frustration.

The Observer watched another man walk up to the security guards and then suddenly made a sharp U-turn to head back to his motor vehicle. His motor vehicle registration expired on Wednesday and was concerned about a possible run-in with the police if he wasn’t able to make it to another tax office.

“I came to renew my vehicle registration. I might go downtown and try my luck. It is very inconvenient because I have other things to do. I took my lunch time to come and deal with this and now I have to go somewhere else go deal with it. My thing expired today. Today is the last day. Tomorrow morning the police will be out for me. I cannot tell the policeman seh mi go a di tax office yesterday and it lock. Mi affi go try and go downtown to get it dealt with, which pushes me further out of my way,” he said.

Another man was upset because he claimed he had been visiting the Cross Roads Tax Office since Monday and each day, he was not given the impression that the problems being experienced on the inside would last as long as it currently is.

“I came to sort out my vehicle registration but I have to go downtown now. I came here from Monday and I also came on Tuesday. Dem tell me she machine a fix so mi fi hold on. After me wait an hour on Monday, dem seh nothing naa go gwaan. Tuesday was the same. I paid transportation fare from Vineyard Town to come here. If I had known it would take so long, I would have gone straight downtown.”

According to chief corporate communication officer at TAJ, Meris Haughton, said Wednesday that there was a push to have things back on track at the Cross Roads office by Monday. In the meantime, she encouraged people to utilise their online platform to access numerous services in order to alleviate the burden on them.

“We closed the Cross Roads Office to correct a situation that is unfolding that is not healthy for the staff or the customers, so we are dealing with that as an emergency procurement to have some things changed out of the AC and that will take a couple of days. We are closed for the rest of the week and anticipate that we will be opening on Monday.

“There was a high odour in the building and we thought it was a sewer issue. We had it checked and it was determined that it was something at fault with the AC. Our service providers are working with us to have that changed out and we are doing that as quickly as we can in the interest of staff and customers. If persons have respiratory challenges and so on, it is going to impact them so that was the case. I know that a report was made on Friday and that was checked into. They thought they had that resolved.

“On Monday when the staff arrived they recognised that it was a little more worrisome. What was done on Friday didn’t seem to address the issue. We have redeployed some of the staff to our Kingston and St Andrew Revenue Service Centres so we can bolster the staff complement there as we also have redirected customers to use those offices or any other office that is convenient to them. We are also encouraging persons that there are a number of services we offer online, a suite of services. We are reminding and encouraging persons to use the online services for those services available online.”