Council tax benefit and bailiffs- Help!

chesky369

......hopefully ......

I think that's the key word in pingupenguin's post. Not one to rely on.

Faye449

I didn't receive the form they were going to send me so I went down to the council offices in person on friday afternoon and filled it in with one of the advisers. She said she would let the bailiff know that a benefit claim was in progress and I've not heard or seen anything of him as yet.

Will be contacting the CCCS this week wrt my other problems so will get that added to the list in the interim and follow their advice.

MickBee

Faye449 wrote: »

OMG help.
...
I lost my job over the summer last year, went to the job centre and signed on and was informed that I would be entitled to council tax benefit and that they would, and I quote "contact the my local council and sort it all out" I naively assumed this was all fine and that they had done it as I didn't hear anything and yesterday I opened a Final Notice from a Bailiff for £751!

This is the first thing I heard from them even though, when I called the council in a flap this morning they insisted they had tried to contact me in November last year.

Council are sending me benefit form to complete today but are saying they may not be able to back date anything as its nearly the end of the council tax year- is this right?!
...
I am FINALLY starting a new job on monday so will be able to start paying properly but am just in such a state about this I can't think straight.
...

Based on my experience as a Local Authority benefits officer a few years ago, this is what happened - or should have happened.

When you claimed JSA last summer, one of the forms you completed was a NHB1(CTB) - legally a written claim for Council Tax Benefit (CTB.) The form does not ask all the questions that the LA needs to be answered; when the DWP decided that you qualified for JSA(IB) they should have passed the NHB1(CTB) to the LA, ideally within 2 working days of their decision (and the DWP is meant to keep records of forms they send. )
The LA should have sent you one of their forms, and allowed you 4 weeks to return it with any evidence they need. It would have been good practice to send a follow-up letter & form when the first was not returned.
When they decided that your claim was defective (for lack of form and evidence) they should have sent you a letter saying so, with these reasons and giving details of the appeals procedure.

You confirm in other posts that these letters and forms were not received by you - and that can happen for several reasons (not produced, sent to wrong address, postal errors.)

I'm glad that you completed your CTB claim form last Friday, and that you have a new job from tomorrow. If you did not do so on your form, it may be worth appealing against the decision they presumably took in November/December to make your previous claim defective. I know that it takes time & effort, but it is worth several hundred pounds. If you are told that you are out of time, ask for copies of all the letters that they sent you.

A few general tips for those unused to dealing with benefits sections (DWP or LA)
(1) If possible, take forms and documents to an office and get a receipt. (If staff are properly trained, they should offer receipts - certainly issue them if asked. If they don't, ask to see a supervisor.)
(2) Many benefits work on a weekly basis, so claiming on Friday is better than the following Monday.
(3) Most staff are reasonable, but most are also overworked - mistakes happen, and the system is less than perfect. Being polite but firm is better than being abusive (as in most walks of life.)

fluffymovie

CIS wrote: »

Council Tax documents are served under section 7 of the Interpretations Act 1978 under which proof of postage is proof of receipt.

I work in council tax recovery and nobody ever receives the documents which are posted whereas the actual number of peope who dont get documents in reality is minimal. Having to prove delivery of every document would be impossible to administer.

Hi CIS,

Yes, sorry, I did mean to say that it is rare that the post that is sent is not received that all post that is sent by Ctax is considered to have been delivered as long as it can be shown to have been sent. This is using our Northgate system which shows all bills, reminders and summons.

In my LA, if someone makes a benefit claim, but maintains that they didn't receive post (e.g, reminder letters or reviews), we go along with the postage rule you stated. However, if they have previously reported post going missing to the Post Office and can provide evidence of this, we are able to review our decision not to pay or cancel a claim for example.

I apologise if I was unclear as I realise from the amount of letters I send out each day, that it would not be possible to verify receipt.

fivefingers

bestpud wrote: »

I agree, they don't just send out bailiffs - you will have received numerous letters from them before it got to this point.

Did you ignore them because you thought it was all being paid, or for another reason?

Maybe the did not send a letter, maybe it was lost in the post, maybe post was stolen, maybe it was sent to the wrong address... these things happen often. I know because something similar happened to me, got a letter from an employer i worked for 5 years ago saying I had been overpaid 6 years ago, the bill had been passed to a collection agency because my old work had been writing to my old address, the debt collection agency has greater means of finding where people live and that is why the letter found me at my new address.

I think you are living in a royal mail utopia where all mail magically finds its home without any problems... you are also jumping to conclusions without having any of the facts, but thats nothing new on this forum....

fluffymovie

Fivefingers.

I have also had post lost but I think the relevant part of this is that the OP is referring to Council Tax so the bill will most probably relate to the property they occupy (or else the bill would be sent elsewhere). This would kind of eliminate the idea that the post was sent to the wrong address.

On Ctax, the addresses are given to the council by the vaulation office and so you do have some cases where the addresses are slightly out to that the customer gives, eg Kingston House Maisonette could be First Floor flat etc, but it is likely that the customer would have been sent some post.

As the bill in question relates to Council tax, there would have been a bill, at least 1 reminder, a summons and other court related paperwork so it would be hard to understand how all of these documents had gone missing, but not impossible.

Thing is, I work for benefits and I hear, I didn't get the letter at least once a day. However, this is normally where a claim has been cancelled or suspended and not when I have issued a cheque, these normally arrive safely.

I don't think anyone is intending to judge the OP but rather offer some advice on the way forward and perhaps try to understand the situation more fully than a few lines in the OP