Bailiffs and council tax

[stgeorgiaandthedragon]

This is really distressing as twice I have returned home from work to find an aggressive hand delivered letter telling me I owe money to the council (from a previous address, not my current one.)

I lived in the property temporarily for eleven months and I definitely paid all my council tax. However I cannot get anyone to listen: the council say I must tell the bailiff, the bailiff insists I need to let the council know. I have had conversations with both several times and got absolutely nowhere.

The amount is over seven hundred pounds and so it isn't a small amount that might be worth paying for peace of mind. Can anybody help?

Have you spoken to citizens advice?

No, I work full time and am unable to get an appointment.

Could you write to your mp and get them to look at it if the council won't help?

Have you asked the council for a breakdown of the liability and payments you made? have you checked that they have correctly recorded the dates you arrived at and left the property? Have you checked that all the payments you made have been recorded on that account and not allocated to any other account?

It may be a clerical error, they happen frequently when people move and don't tell the council tax department and if there is no reference number on a payment then it cannot be allocated and would be sitting in a big suspense account.
I'd write to the council tax department copying in your local ward councillor asking for a complete explanation of how you owe this money. Get your ward councillor involved and then they will stop simply referring you back to the bailiffs.

Yu need to send the council a letter by a trackable method. In the letter you need to include evidence of when you moved into the property concerned and when you moved out. You also need to send evidence of the payments made during that period. Keep a copy of everything that you have sent to them and ask that they resolve the situation within 14 days.

It's a bizarre situation - I will try to explain it!

I moved on the 1 November 2011. I became very unwell within 2 weeks of moving, and by the beginning of December I was admitted to hospital. I needed an operation and was allowed out in mid January. To be honest I had forgotten about the council tax and it was handed to bailiffs then. I paid it promptly as I did owe it. That was for £650 and I paid that in February 2012.

When I moved out in September 2012 (the council did/do know) I thought I had paid everything but I hadn't as 10 months later () I had another bailiff visit to my current address and I owed more money. That did make sense as obviously although I was only there for one year it straddled two financial years. I paid that - €783 in total. I have records of both coming out of my bank account and bailiffs and council alike concede I have paid these. They cannot explain where this third huge sum has arisen from as they both just keep saying I need to speak to the other.

It was a hazy year for me due to being so poorly but as you can see from above I do pay what I owe (and have never defaulted on council tax before, it was just because I was in hospital then recovering from an operation and was so ill and exhausted much of the time I wasn't on top of my finances; thankfully I have direct debits for everything else so it all ticked over nicely, it was just this one I hadn't set up a DD for as moving in coincided with illness!) However I have paid two (large!) amounts for a total of eleven months and I absolutely do not owe any more.

I used to work in Council Tax and this is definitely one for the billing side of things, so council tax. They will try to fob you with the whole it has been passed to the bailiff bit but you are disputing the bill.

Your first bill for £650 seems ridiculously high for a 2/3 month period.

I would email them, you should get a standard "we will deal with your query within X number of days bit"

Ask them for a breakdown of the charges, from when and to when. This is a very simple task for them. They can then also list the payments you have made against the account.

I personally think something has gone very wrong with the billing side of things. When a bill is produced mid year it would say "charges from 1/11/11 to 31/3/12.

Then the next year's bill would be 1/4/12 - 31/3/13 even if you had called them to tell them you were moving out on 1st May (I know you didn't) but the bill is always apportioned after the move date in case something goes wrong with the move.

So your second bill should say 1/4/12 - Sept 2012.

Any discounts (single person/occupancy) should show and the payments should be listed. Honestly, it is the most simple thing for them to show you. If there is any query over where that other bill came from then the person who dealt with your call is at fault for not dealing with it, and investigating why you have another amount outstanding.

Sorry this is long, I am also very concerned how fast the first part of the bill was escalated to bailiff stage. There is legislation laid down about how you are billed, then reminded then final billed, then court date for a liability order, then the court date and liability order produced after that date and then follow up. Seems remarkably fast.

Could the first bill be from your previous address?

At the end of the day, email the council, state you are disputing the amount, are happy to pay anything you genuinely owe, ask for complete bill breakdown and payments made.

Contended, thank you, that is so helpful.

The first bill can't have been from a previous address, as I lived in a different county council then and also was definitely up to date with all payments.

I am really grateful for your help in this matter.

I couldn't stop thinking about how fast the chase up was on this.

So just to confirm, I assume you were renting the property in question, and had a tenancy agreement from 1st November 2011 and not before that date. Therefore your first payment date would have been 1st December. There is no way that following government guidelines that your non-payment should have been escalated to bailiff stage in January.

Something is very wrong. Like I say email the council, dispute the bill and ask for copies of the bill which they should be able to email you and details of your payments made.

I will keep this thread in my watched bit and check back to see what has happened.

Thankfully the liability order granted by a magistrates court does not show up on any credit check etc, it merely gives the council extra powers to collect any monies outstanding.

I can't for the life of me see how this could have anything to do with the bailiffs. They've been told to collect a certain amount of money. They can't dispute the reason why the amount is what it is, surely?

Don't you have a final statement from that property showing the Council Tax as all paid?

Yes you would have a final statement. Usually you pay for 12 months over 10 months meaning for every month you pay in advance for that month plus a bit extra that covers those 2 months where you don't pay anything (February and March)

In theory you have the account closed and there is a small amount of money to come back to you, so a finalised bill and a cheque or if you left a DD open then it gets transferred back into your account.

The council don't like taking an account back from the bailiffs but they can put a hold on the collection until you are told of what you have been charged and what you have paid.

In my opinion it has been cocked up because the council follow legislation regarding collection of monies for council tax. Bill, reminder, final notice, summons to court then letter after court date with liability order details. Only after all that would it go to a bailiff. It seems way too fast to have taken place in the timescales you gave.

Dispute the bill, ask for a full breakdown of charges and dates.