Council Tax Rebanding SUCCESS stories

Leon_W

Local Borough Council: Bath and North East Somerset
Council Tax Band Before: E
Council Tax Band After: D
Amount refunded: £938.81 + savings going forward


A very quick response from this council (for once). It took a bit of digging around to find the correct phone numbers for the right people to speak too as I'm sure they intend to keep sending you round in circles.

I've always thought I was in the wrong band since we moved in just over 3 years ago. Next door neighbours detatched house has always sold for slightly more money going back over the years and they are in Band C ! A clear case if ever there was one. I thought it should be Band D and not E.

Phoned the valuation office (which is in Bristol by the way) on 01179302213 (direct number !)

Heard nothing for 3 weeks then got a letter rebanding to D and a refund of £938.81 direct to my bank account.

Result.

Maisie

poorperson wrote:

I was under the impression that only the VOA could change a banding and the council just paid out.

Yes you apply to the voa who check the banding and apply any changes to this.

This is then referred to the council (by voa) who make any refunds due.

See the chat discussion thread. Lots of advice on there.

maisie

widewater_2

Local Council: Adur District Council
Council Tax Band Before: E
Council Tax Band After: D
Amount Refunded: £2610
Annual Saving Going Forward £301

I telephoned the Local Valuation Office on 25 January 2007, they took just a few details such as number of rooms, any off road parking or conservatory etc. and was told up to 6 weeks before notification.

On 15 February 2007 received a letter from the Valuer rebanding to D from E. Took the letter to my local Council Offices and gave written notice that I would be adding interest on a daily basis at the current basic rate.

Received a letter the following day with a notification that £2610.95 would be credited directly to my bank account. Definately a worthwhile exercise, the wife wants a new bathroom.

nicks

#68

I am in Scotland & we received our confirmation letter on Saturday to say we have been re-banded from an 'E' to a 'D' - backdated to Feb 1998.

I made 1 initial phone call & was successfull. They did all this for my neighbour too, based on my call. We are 1 of 3 identical houses (2 are/were 'E' & 1 'D').

We are in the Perth & Kinross area. We also now save £300.00+ on the Council Tax every year, as well as having a nice cheque due to us.

Nickie

superpikey

Local Borough Council: Bromley
Council Tax Band Before: F
Council Tax Band After: E
Amount refunded: £2,240.56
Annual saving going forward: £257.00

After reading 'what to do next' on Martin's Money I wrote to the VOA with evidence as suggested by Martin. Acknowledged within the week. 12 February 2007 letter from VOA confirming new band as E and told to contact local authority. Did this by telephone and was told how much they owed me. Received FOURTEEN letters this morning, one for each year of the overpayment and now have to contact the council to claim the money back. Less than a month. WELL DONE BROMLEY and THANK YOU VERY MUCH MARTIN.

SSuzanne

I read the stuff on your site before christmas and discovered that my mum's neighbour (semi detached identical house!) was paying band C while my mum was on D. Turned out neighbour had appealed at the start. 3 out of the 6 houses in my mums cul-de-sac were C and 3 D. Out of 75 houses in her road, 1/4 are C, the rest D - the houses are ALL identical!!
Checked valuations as you suggested and found the house was def in wrong band.
Mum wrote and was immediately turned down as "invalid" She wrote again with more info obtained from the links on your site - turned down again as invalid. She phoned and was told again she should have applied within 6 months. THen got a letter last week to say she had tribunal date 18 March - but today got a letter saying she had been re-banded to a C. Backdated to 1993, but no mention of a refund (although I hope this will follow)
So big thanks from my mum (who has told the remainder of the neighbours that she knows so they can do the same (Unlike the 3 who already had appealed - one of whom is a friend and my mum shops for!!! Some people are funny aren't they?

rrv462

THANKS MARTIN.........
Local Borough Council:east-northants
Council Tax Band Before:Band D
Council Tax Band After :Band C
Amount Refunded :£700
Saving A Year :£145
We moved in to our newly built mid-terrace town house in Aug 2002 and didn't question the banding of our property but after watching the ITV broadcast i decided to check our banding there are 10 properties in all in our design all have been put in at band D after doing all the calculations i found out that they worked out to band C i double checked and it can out the same so i approached the VOA Office 4 weeks later got a letter saying that their banding was right even though our property was £5k away from being in band D i rung the VOA and told them i dont agree they tried to get rid of us by saying the NATIONWIDE calculator isnt accurate upon this i said i wanted to go further with my case 2 hrs later i got a call agreeing we are a band C

spankygoodtime

I've lived in my rented flat for almost 11 years. It is in a house where other tenants share bathrooms and loos - although my place is the only one that is totally self contained.

For most of that time the three landlords I've had have been happy to pay the council tax themselves.

Islington authority came around last year and demanded that each tenant be billed individually, and put each room in a different banding. Our current landlord appealed, saying he wanted the house taxed as a whole so he could carry on paying it himself. I showed him this website. He did not succeed in getting the house rebanded as one, but the banding on each room has been bought down to the lowest - A.

My flat had been classified as a D bend property and I was due to go to tribunal today. I had a call late yesterday saying I would not have to go, as the council accepted my banding was wrong.

I still feel it is nonsense to put a market value on a bedsit where the tenant shares facilities. Who would buy such a place? My own flat has one of the shared loos near it, although other residents are clean and considerate no one would buy a property with a shared loo outside opposite the front door.

Thanks to the link on the site I was able to see how other properties are banded in the street. My landlord owns the house next door, which is a mirror image of this one - the only difference being that as we are on the end of terrace, those tenants come down our side entrance to use the shared garden.

What surprised me was that the landlord was paying council tax on the whole house next door - this hadn't changed. When I raised this on the phone yesterday, the housing officer said that they hadn't realised that both properties were owned and rented out by him. I enlightened him as fair is fair. Both sets of tenants should be treated in the same way. But what a bunch of incompetents there must be at the council for this to be overlooked.

Great info on the site and I can't thank you enough.

Academic

Local Borough Council: East Riding of Yorkshire
Council Tax Band Before: D
Council Tax Band After: C
Amount Refunded: £1386.78
Annual saving going forward: £143.48

Interest on overpayment (from VOA): £339.52

After reading the Council Tax article on the MSE website I checked the banding of the properties in our street. Discovered that our neighbour's house (the other half of our semi-detached) was re-banded in December 1994 from D to C. Wrote to the VOA to point out this discrepancy, they replied very quickly stating they would investigate the situation. Shortly thereafter we were advised that our property would also be re-banded. Our local council, East Riding of Yorkshire, quickly refunded the money owed to us.

Thanks to several posts on the forum (especially some early info from Jamesiebabie) I again wrote to the VOA regarding their duty to undertake consequential changes. Once again the VOA replied very promptly and stated they would review the matter. I have now received a payment from the VOA (£339 of compounded interest on the overpaid amount) due to their error in not changing our banding in 1994.

Thanks to all those people who took time to post information on the original thread.

Whilst I realize that the VOA made the mistake of not re-banding our property in 1994 the local office (Hull) have been very professional and have dealt with this matter efficiently.

Poppycat

I am in same boat. I am in C just moved to property, found out I should be in B although the VOA indicates I may go up a band due to some work.

My neigbour is in B same house, accept my garage is atached to the house where his is a few feet away