Council Tax Rebanding SUCCESS stories

Analyst

lincroft1710 said:

Analyst said:

lincroft1710 said:

Analyst said:

lincroft1710 said:

Analyst said:

lincroft1710 said:

Analyst said:

lincroft1710 said:

Analyst said:

lincroft1710 said:

Analyst said:

The VOA are using incorrect house dimensions and house price index data (which is disallowed) to reject our request for a banding change.

The VOA use Gross External Area to measure houses, whereas developers and EAs use Gross Internal Area, thus there is an explainable difference. What are your reasons for believing the VOA have used an incorrect HPI (which are unreliable anyway and rarely used by the VOA)? 

The VOA disallow the use of HPI because it is unreliable, but then use it as their main argument for rejecting a reduction in banding. Also the "smaller" house that has a lower banding is clearly a similar size from Google earth, the building plans and having been inside to look. It is not smaller, and if anything would sell for more than our property if it ever came on the market.

Can you quote what the VOA actually have said about HPI in their reply?

If the "smaller house" is of a similar size to yours, then the VOA may have undermeasured it and thus could be underbanded or they could have overmeasured yours. Only a site visit or viewing dimensioned builders' plans could determine which one was incorrectly measured or identified.

"The housing market was subject to a fall in prices from 1991" That is all the decline stands on. The context is that the first sale of a similar property was 1995, so that is the only price evidence I could supply. Naturally it is less than the top of the lower band, and lower by enough to have been realistically below that band in 1991. You can make it any figure you like by applying a suitable index, national, regional, local etc would all give different answers.

My last 12 years of working in the VOA were spent dealing with CT appeals. As the VOA has details of 99.9% of property sales in the country, it was easy to see how house prices were falling between 1991 and 1993/4/5 by reference to actual property sales rather than using HPIs. If it is of any use to you, in my area we established the fall between 1991 and 1995 was around 25%. 

Property prices only fell 4% in our region, so there is a high probability that many properties went up in value. Note that the ROA stated that property prices fell, not that they fell in our area, or even that they fell by enough to change banding.

Can you supply the VOA with evidence that property prices only fell in your area by 4% between 1991 and 1995 other than by reference to HPI?

The implication would be that if the VOA stated property prices fell it would be relevant to the area in which the subject dwelling was situated. A fall in property prices after the antecedent valuation date would not lead to a band reduction. 

I can't get any pre 1995 prices for the area. The properties are self build and I would not trust the valuation provided by the owner when they were built, even if I could get them.
As I am working backwards, a larger fall in property prices would be required to push the property into its current band.

Where did you get the figure of a 4% fall from 1991 to 1995?

Nationwide

I think you are going to struggle to convince the VOA there is any merit in your case

Not so, they are reviewing again. Thank you for your help.

Woamwedo

Stockport MBC
Was D
Now C
Refunded £3996 to July 1993
Future saving £229 pa indexed at 5%

My story is, this has not always been on my radar. But what a result!

We lived on a road that was a half mixture of individual large detached houses & bungalows, the rest 25 pairs of semi’s with 4 detached all built to the same footprint. One of which, we owned.  The houses were built by a company called Lomas in 1961 and as far as we were aware, all band D, even though plenty had large extensions to the side or rear, a few both.  It was only a passing chat with friends, that it became worthy of interest. Said friends had the same basic house that had been extended at the side, with an extra bathroom, en suite, downstairs loo, 2 extra bedrooms, large utility and  another reception room. All topped off with a large conservatory. Ours had a garage/utility added and an extended dining room. Friend is band D & was surprised when we said ours was also D. 

Checking the VOA website revealed that the Lomas houses on the road are a mixture of mostly D, 8 C & 3 E. Scrutinising the various properties, it turns out all the C’s were rebanded from D. So armed with that detail, the request for a review went in late January. Evidence was a house 3 doors down more or less identical to ours was a C and a couple over the road also C. Towards the end of February I was asked to ring a VOA employee and had a good long amiable chat about the vagaries of the whole Council Tax system. I was not given any indication of the outcome but I thought have looked at the houses nearby, it was a strong challenge. Then success arrived in a letter on 21st March saying yes the house was rebanded to C.

The only negative is Stockport Council. When I contacted them to ascertain timescales to the refund, they denied all knowledge of any correspondence from the VOA, despite the letter I received stating the council had also been notified. Thereafter correspondence & contact was one way.  I only received the refund this week with the council taking 3 months to process the claim.

But a win is a win as they say and as I write this, checking the VOA database, I discovered my friend who opened the debate has also got a reduction from D to C. 

Well done Martin.

doraspenlow

Hello. I put my application for review in about six weeks ago. I haven't heard back yet, but, checking on the VOA website, my house has been changed from a band E to a band D. Does this mean I have been successful, or could it just be a weird admin thing?

There is also a link to click that says 'view previous bands for this property', which takes me to a page showing that it was previously an E.

lincroft1710

doraspenlow said:

Hello. I put my application for review in about six weeks ago. I haven't heard back yet, but, checking on the VOA website, my house has been changed from a band E to a band D. Does this mean I have been successful, or could it just be a weird admin thing?

There is also a link to click that says 'view previous bands for this property', which takes me to a page showing that it was previously an E.

It wouldn't be a "weird admin thing".


The band may have been reduced as part of an exercise reducing the bands of similar houses or it may have been reduced following your application and either the confirmatory paperwork has not been sent or it got lost in the post

Woamwedo

doraspenlow said:

Hello. I put my application for review in about six weeks ago. I haven't heard back yet, but, checking on the VOA website, my house has been changed from a band E to a band D. Does this mean I have been successful, or could it just be a weird admin thing?

There is also a link to click that says 'view previous bands for this property', which takes me to a page showing that it was previously an E.

Hi Dora, Yes you have been successful. You should get a letter soon from the VOA, thereafter it depends on your council. My tale is just above your post. A friend has just been rebanded the same as me on the same road but our outcomes were slightly different. I had to wait almost 3 months and had no correspondence at all from Stockport Council. I more or less had to hound them to cough up. My friend like you found out looking on the VOA website. It was only last week and he received his letter yesterday confirming his appeal had been successful. He also received an email from the council outlining his 17 years of overpayment. How long it takes for him to get his refund will be interesting. It looks like no 2 outcomes are the same. 

The whole council tax system seems to be in disrepute. I am in the process of buying a new build and already built houses identical to mine are showing 2 different bands. Make sense of that.

mattbuk

I have just won my council tax rebranding and they’ve lowered it from a C to a B. After a lot of work from my end, might I add - including measuring my house!

I’ve just received my revised statements from the council none of which are easy to understand and nothing with a final amount they owe back to me.

However, from the way it’s all worded as in your overall account balance  is -£110.87, I think they are trying to deduct the money they owe me from this years council tax, rather than reimburse me in full. Which I want. Can they do this or have I a right to request the money back in full?

lincroft1710

mattbuk said:

I’ve just received my revised statements from the council none of which are easy to understand and nothing with a final amount they owe back to me.

However, from the way it’s all worded as in your overall account balance  is -£110.87, I think they are trying to deduct the money they owe me from this years council tax, rather than reimburse me in full. Which I want. Can they do this or have I a right to request the money back in full?

Yes they can do this and yes you can ask for the money to be refunded to you

mattbuk

lincroft1710 said:

mattbuk said:

I’ve just received my revised statements from the council none of which are easy to understand and nothing with a final amount they owe back to me.

However, from the way it’s all worded as in your overall account balance  is -£110.87, I think they are trying to deduct the money they owe me from this years council tax, rather than reimburse me in full. Which I want. Can they do this or have I a right to request the money back in full?

Yes they can do this and yes you can ask for the money to be refunded to you

Great, thank you. I’ll ring them on Monday. I just wanted to make sure I could ask for it back in full, if they refuse to at first, before I called. It would also help, if it was clear how much they owed me. As it’s a clear as mud at the moment.

Graham_Reed

Dear All, 

I have recently had a victory against the VOA and had my own council tax band reduced, however, there are 35 other identical properties in this development, and I was shocked to find that their respective Council Tax Banding would not be reduced. I have since been informed that each individual property will have to make the claim using my victory document, which would be a huge amount of individual effort. My question is has anyone has any success in bringing a group valuation reduction and if so how did you approach it. 

Kind Regards

Graham Reed  

lincroft1710

Graham_Reed said:

Dear All, 

I have recently had a victory against the VOA and had my own council tax band reduced, however, there are 35 other identical properties in this development, and I was shocked to find that their respective Council Tax Banding would not be reduced. I have since been informed that each individual property will have to make the claim using my victory document, which would be a huge amount of individual effort. My question is has anyone has any success in bringing a group valuation reduction and if so how did you approach it. 

Kind Regards

Graham Reed  

Unless your band was reduced by the Valuation Tribunal, your neighbours cannot make proposals but can only ask for a band review. I am not certain that a "group valuation reduction" is possible if a proposal can be made and it shouldn't take many minutes to make a proposal.


With a band review, it just needs to be along the lines of

"We the undersigned request that our respective CT bands are reduced in line with that of (insert the address of the property that the reduction)"

Then have a list of all addresses with "(name of occupier) Occupier (signature of occupier) against each entry.


Usually the VOA  would initiate band reductions of identical house types, so I am wondering if the VOA are of the opinion that some or all of the other houses do not warrant a reduction.