Help Council Tax

HonestDave

Evening Moneysavers,

I need a little bit advice from the experts here. I have fallen behind in my council tax payments and had an outstanding balance I called the council and setup a payment plan. but unfortunately my DD bounced in november i payed by debit card a few days later it then bounced again in december once again payed late.

Because i didn't keep to my agreement by letting my DD bounce and pay on time the debt was passed to equita on the 2nd january. I have made my payments to the council to bring my account up to date but have the outstanding bailiff charge of £40 to pay.

What are my rights regarding paying charges can i straight up refuse to pay it because i am just scraping by on my current income and have applied to get a second job to help me.

will they denote the instalment plan i have to pay or will they accept £10 per month or something equally as ridiculous in protest to having to pay the fees.

or finally should i just suck it up stop whining and pay the damn fees risk my rent bouncing this month and see what happens.

Note to all, the staff in the call Center at Equita have no soul.
People at council collections are really nice people.

niccatw

It depends on how good you are at standing your ground. My guess would be that the council are within their rights to forward to DCA as you were unable to keep up with your side of the agreement.

However, if they are nice people, it may be worht your while going into the council office and asking them what they can do to help you keep up your side of the bargain. If your direct debits bounced and you paid up within a reasonable time-scale of that, they may be willing to help you out - they can take the debt back and ask the DCA to mark it as settled on your behalf, if they want to! They won't advertise this! You need to be clear on how many payments you've missed, the dates they were due, when you cleared them. If you're polite and genuine and they are as nice as you say, it's worth a shot.

If it doesn't work, then you need to suck it up! it easier to do this if you only deal with the DCA via letter or email. As you say, they have no soul and "conversations" tend to be pointless and frustrating!

RAS

Equita can charge up to £42.50 if they have made two visits to collect the debt. Did you receive visit letters?

HonestDave

@niccatw
I did initially phone Equita and they basically said you have to pay us you still owe us the full amount plus fees ect I offered up the payment references from the council and she was trying to say its not here problem and i need to speak to the council or pay up. I know its no her problem that i was late paying my tax but she didn't need to put it as bluntly as she did.

After having a frustrating time on the phone to them i decided to phone the council and see what they would say. I got through to a very nice woman who checked on my account and agreed i had made the payments neccacery(sp?) to bring my account up to date although late. I asked if the council would speak to equita to tell them i have payed and cancel the fees she said that all she can do is to send them a memo with my payments on and i will have to deal with them to pay the outstanding fees.

one thing i didn't mention in my original post was that the agreement i had was cancelled by the council after the bounced DD so i payed the outstanding balance in full but not until after it had been passed to equita.

@RAS

They have sent me a letter telling me that they have been unable to contact me at my house and that I should call there office to arrange a visit for them to take my property. Does this mean that they will have put another fee onto of there standard fee. And if they do then what chance do i have of politely telling them to go away. As i wouldn't want to throw away any more money than i have to.

niccatw

If paying the fees is going to risk your rent bouncing, then you can only offer them what you can afford to offer them. Your council tax is up-to-date now and that is the most important thing. If it's only outstanding fees they are chasing you for, then don't risk the roof over your head! If you can only offer £10 a month, then do that. If you can afford more, I'd be tempted to pay up as soon as just to be rid of the stress!

DarkConvict

The £42.50 is the charge for two visits, ask equita for a breakdown of the charges. First and 2nd visits are charged differently. Further visits cannot be charged at all unless they gain entry to the house.

RAS

HonestDave wrote: »

one thing i didn't mention in my original post was that the agreement i had was cancelled by the council after the bounced DD so i payed the outstanding balance in full but not until after it had been passed to equita.

@RAS

They have sent me a letter telling me that they have been unable to contact me at my house and that I should call there office to arrange a visit for them to take my property. Does this mean that they will have put another fee onto of there standard fee. And if they do then what chance do i have of politely telling them to go away. As i wouldn't want to throw away any more money than i have to.

Let's take two thing here

If you still live in the area whare the debt was incurred, get hold of your local councillor. many do surgeries at the weekend and these are listed on the local council webs-site and in local libaries.

Since you paid before the debt was passed to equita, your councillor may be able to sort this out for you.

Second point, under NO circumstance do you allow a bailiff into your house. This enables them to charge lots of extra fees and to re-enter your house to remove the goods they have secured the debt against.

If they only sent one letter, the fee is £24.50, I think. Two letters is another £19 and after that they cannot add any more unless they get in the house or levy on a car.

HonestDave

@RAS

I will look into seeing the counsellor but not sure that he can help as it was after the debt was passed to equita i payed it not before.

They have no chance of getting into my house unless they come with police officers and a warrant from the county court saying they can force entry.

Last thing about the car, are they allowed to touch it if it is under a finance agreement. Also it seems illogical to take a £7k car for a £40 charge what do they do sell it and give you the change and am i allowed to break there arms if they do.

Ps im only joking about the last bit, its the best way of keeping sane.

RAS

If the car is on HP, they cannot touch it (the car still belongs to the HP company). They can levy if it is on a loan as you own the car.

I would suggest you e-mail equita demanding a breakdown of costs.

RAS

The expert on bailiffs is Herbie21. She provided this advice to a previous OP.

You need to WRITE to Equita or better still send an e-mail to:

[EMAIL="info@equita.co.uk"]info@equita.co.uk[/EMAIL]

You need to say something along the following lines.

I refer to the above account in relation to unpaid council tax due to xxxx

As you will be aware from your files this account has been assed to your bailiff Mr xxx to enforce.

The query that I have is concerning the amount that your bailiff is now stating is due. You will be aware that your bailiff visited my premises on xxx and for this visit I am advised that Mr xxx may only charge a fee of £24.50 for "attending to levy where no levy was made".

As a matter of urgency can you please provide a full and detailed breakdown of the charges made by your bailiff.


They may well recognise the e-mail but that will not harm.

They can only charge the fee if the letter was delivered by the bailiff by the way.


That might stall them long enough to get the rent paid.

You need to find ways of reducing your spends, sell a few books on amazon or do a car boot to raise the fees that you actually have to pay.

HonestDave

Just an update, Eqita have not acknowledged any payment from the council until today this has caused my account to be passed from the equity office out to the baliff incurring more charges.

Have spoken to the council and they have advised to write to them and they will review my account so i have sent the following email to both the council and equita with appropriate reference numbers

Good Evening,

I have an outstanding council tax bill from 2008 that a payment plan was set up against. Unfortunately I had two direct debits fail once in November 2009 and again in December 2009. This has provoked the account to be passed over to Equita LTD to recover the charge. I have since made two payments to [Council Name ] one of £87 and another of £148.70 reference numbers [Reference number] and [reference number] respectively. This leaves an outstanding balance of £35 on my council tax this can be paid on the 26th of February direct to [council]. I have been advised that in a exceptional circumstance that the charge can be withdrawn from Equita and pulled back to the council thus eliminating any fees that may have been charged to the account since it was passed over, but still would have to pay the summons charge if not covered by the payments that I have made.
I ask that you review my case and if at all possible withdraw the charge from Equita on the condition that the final payment of £35 is made via the [council] payments line on the evening of 26th February 2010.

In this email I am in no way refusing to pay the outstanding balance of my council tax bill.

Regards,

[My Name]