Council Tax and retrospective benefits.

mcscoty1973

Macro wrote: »

Absolutely! For example, someone claims initially in a hostel, for which they have liability to pay rent but not council tax

In short, it is not reasonable to assume that because HB was paid in full without CTB that the LA was at fault. It does happen.

Okay fair point about being in a hostel.

At the time the girlfriend was required to pay full council tax she was on full housing benefit and CTB should have been paid. Will have to check with the council why this was not the case.

In my view it is the council who pay housing benefit, so they should know if your on full HB that you should also automatically receive full CTB as well as both come from the same source. Its not really rocket science. If the council found out that someone wasn't entitled to benefit they would take great delight in asking them to pay what they owe....same view should be taken here.

terryw

At the moment we are guessing. Please come back after your girlfriend and you have had a word with the council, and the posters here will be glad to help.

Macro_3

mcscoty1973 wrote: »

Okay fair point about being in a hostel.

At the time the girlfriend was required to pay full council tax she was on full housing benefit and CTB should have been paid. Will have to check with the council why this was not the case.

In my view it is the council who pay housing benefit, so they should know if your on full HB that you should also automatically receive full CTB as well as both come from the same source. Its not really rocket science. If the council found out that someone wasn't entitled to benefit they would take great delight in asking them to pay what they owe....same view should be taken here.

Morally, perhaps, but the responsibility as far as the regs go lies with the claimant. She would have zero success arguing tha the council had a moral responsibility to advise her that she could claim CTB, because there is simply no room within the regs to pay her because of this.

The only way in which she could have benefit paid for a back period which dates back so far would be if she could prove that a claim for CTB was made but not processed. Given the level of CT arrears and the prolonged period that they cover, I would be surprised if this were the case, but it's worth a try.