Bailiff Charges?

triffidfood

We have bailiffs coming round tomorrow (or sometime after tomorrow), in relation to outstanding Council Tax.

We have not previously allowed them into the house and they have not previously been able to gain ‘peaceful entry’.

The Notice we received from them today stated an outstanding amount owed which seemed excessive, so we phoned them. They said that they had added £124.00 in charges, for FOUR previous visits (so presumably £31 per visit).

Does anyone here know if this is legal? My understanding was, they’re only allowed to charge for TWO visits (without gaining entry) ~ is this actually laid down in statute or is it just good practice? Can they make as many visits as they want and charge what they want?

Thanks for any replies.

tf (Paul)

amosworks

Bump!
stupid 10 char post requirement

OberonSH

No idea, I've always dealt with them and paid the chargem usually about £45 for levy. You could run a search in google or what have you for the laws regarding it?

**purpleprincess**

triffidfood wrote:

We have bailiffs coming round tomorrow (or sometime after tomorrow), in relation to outstanding Council Tax.

We have not previously allowed them into the house and they have not previously been able to gain ‘peaceful entry’.

The Notice we received from them today stated an outstanding amount owed which seemed excessive, so we phoned them. They said that they had added £124.00 in charges, for FOUR previous visits (so presumably £31 per visit).

Does anyone here know if this is legal? My understanding was, they’re only allowed to charge for TWO visits (without gaining entry) ~ is this actually laid down in statute or is it just good practice? Can they make as many visits as they want and charge what they want?

Thanks for any replies.

tf (Paul)

Hey triffidfood

I was just wondering about you yesterday and had hoped you had got in contact with them to sort it out:o

The charges of £124 sound about right I'm afraid. I'm not at work at the moment but I will be tomorrow day and can get the legislation for you if you like?

Best to sort it out sooner rather than later. There could be additional charges on top of this if you don't........

Have you contacted them since we last spoke?

SSB

Hi
The law regarding Bailiffs is quite complicated but I do not think there are any limits how often they can visit and charge. Have you visited Citizen Advice Bureaux Website? They have factsheet for all sorts of things including Bailiffs.

fatbelly

Have a look at this factsheet

They are only allowed to charge for two visits and the charge for this is £39 (schedule of charges at the end of factsheet)

Tootsie_Roll

**purpleprincess** wrote:

Hey triffidfood

Best to sort it out sooner rather than later. There could be additional charges on top of this if you don't........

Have you contacted them since we last spoke?

Even more importantly you could go to prison !!! I have known this to happen on a couple of occaisions. Ignoring the bailiff will definately not help in the long run - if they return the account to the council they have no option but to start litigation - very, very bad news.

Even if you can only pay them £1 per month make contact.

**purpleprincess**

It is true what tootsie roll said, you could go to prison. Have you sorted it with them yet????????

**purpleprincess**

And I mean the council and not the bailiffs.

martonman

I have managed this several times for myself and others when faced with bailiffs collecting for council tax arrears.

In hindsight the mistake most of us unwittingly make is to enter into any form of negotiation with the bailiffs in the first place.

Always try the council first by telephoning and insisting that you repay the arrears directly to them. Normally they will refuse, saying that the matter is now with the bailiffs and you have to negotiate with them.

As we all know, however, its easier to negotiate with armed terrorists than it is with these firms, who in the main operate with bully boy tactics and scant regard to the law.

Most councils now have automated payment systems for council tax, either by phone or by internet. You can pay with any debit or credit card. These systems will quite happily take your money even after the bailiffs have been instructed, therefore the council has 'accepted' your payment.

Now, if you've done the right thing and refused to let a bailiff in and refused to negotiate with them - you can simply inform them that you are paying the council direct and that they have accepted your payment. The worst they can do is pass the file back to the council, which is what you want in the first place.

If you have already entered into a payment plan with the bailiffs it is very easy to get out of it. Normally they add on loads of illegal charges - things like charging for visits they never made etc etc. One scam they tried with me for 3 Parking Tickets was to shove 3 documents through my letterbox at once, one of each ticket, each with an extra £50 charge on it. That's illegal and will easily be overturned by a court, they're only allowed by law to charge reasonable collection expenses, ie. one charge for all 3 if delivered together.

You have a right to question their expenses and charges.

So, firstly you try and make a payment to the council via one of their automated methods. If that fails, send them a postal order by recorded delivery.

Inform the council in writing that you are unhappy with the charges added on by the bailiff as well as their intimidatory behaviour.

Secondly write to the bailiffs asking for a full statement of everything they have on their systems about you. This should detail every single visit, letter, phone call and charge. Send £10 with this request as this is the maximum they are allowed to charge by law for this information. By law they then have 40 days to reply.

The problem here for most bailiff firms is that they do not keep anything resembling proper records, 9 times out of 10 anything they do send back will totally incriminate them. The law sets out reasonable charges that bailiffs are allowed to make for collecting council tax arrears, the vast majority of bailiffs ignore these rules and are just out to scam as much out of you as they can.

If you spot any indiscrepancies in their charges, write to them claiming the amounts back, sending a copy to the council and also to the local court that certificated the bailiff in the first place. Enough complaints and that bailiff will not be successful in re-applying for his certification. Threaten them with court if they do not repay you.

In the unlikely event that there are no discrepancies - you have been paying the council what you can afford anyway and the bailiff has been taken out of the equation.

If necessary arrange an appointment with the council at their offices. Explain your reasons for the arrears and ask for them to help you fill out a housing benefit / council tax relief claim form - if you've not already done one.

Let them put a face to you, most council staff are understanding.


Hope this post helps someone...


PS - There's a very interesting expose of bailiff charges on this link http://www.dadsplace.co.uk/phil.htm

triffidfood

Well, we beat the bailiffs anyway…

I contacted both the bailiffs & county council at the end of last week .. actually, against my better judgement I did make a payment offer to the bailiffs (I wish I hadn’t bothered now, but anyway) .. I also made it clear, again, that we wouldn’t let them in to our house (I.e. that any initial payment would only be handed over away from the house, e.g. to a rep in a parked car), that my offer was all we could afford & not negotiable, and that we wanted a complete break down of all their charges.

I don’t actually think they had any intention of pursuing the debt much further anyway, because today we had a letter from them saying they’d returned the matter to the local authority & weren’t dealing with it any longer.

Incidentally, the bailiffs in question are North West Commercial Services .. I found the website of the Enforcement Agencies Association, of which NWCS is a member. This includes a code of practice which all ENSAS members are supposed to adhere to (here: http://www.ensas.org.uk/codeofpractice.asp)

I think NWCS are in breach of at least 2 of these codes of practice, namely:

Letters, notices and other documentation sent or delivered to debtors will not be ambiguous or misleading.

… their Final Notice was extremely ambiguous (it implied that they, I.e. the bailiffs, had the power to send the police/ a locksmith round, which they don’t) …

Members should on each and every occasion when a visit is made to a debtors property which incurs the debtor in a fee, leave a notice setting out in detail how the fee was made up

.. they didn’t do this.

So anyway, if they still insist on their charges we’ll contest these.

Now it’s up to the local authority, they could of course refer this straight to the courts (committal), but if so, so be it.

We have contacted them several times offering to pay them, and explaining how the situation arose, so anyway we’ll see what happens next. Actually, the debt relates to a previous address, and we are already paying council tax fortnightly on my new address, and have been since last year, so they could hardly make a case for "willful refusal" could they.

Anyway thanks everyone for your replies. (And thanks especially **purpleprincess** for all your help & concern! )

We'll see what happens now.