Equita Council Tax Bailiffs

uksteve82

Hi everyone

I'm just posting for a bit of advice really. Rather stupidly I fell behind with my 2011/12 Council Tax bill and arranged with the Council to repay this in installments as part of my 2012/13 bill. Again (no lectures please) I fell behind and in October last year returned home to find a letter that had been posted by hand through my letterbox from a company called Equita - bailiffs acting on behalf of the Council.

The letter stated that the outstanding balance of my 2011/12 Council Tax bill was £993.13 and this required paying within 24 hours or bailiffs would visit my home to repossess goods.

I contacted Equita immediately using the call centre telephone number provided on the letter and spoke to an operator who explained I would need to contact the bailiff directly to arrange payment. I informed the operator that this letter was the first time I had ever heard from Equita and asked if it was normal to deal with the bailiff directly in the first instance to which they replied yes and gave me the bailiff's mobile number.

I rang the bailiff immediately but got no answer so left a message on voicemail. The next day he called me back and rather abruptly told me that I had 24 hours to repay £993.13 or he would attend my house to recover my personal goods. I explained that I was unable to repay the amount as a lump sum but offered to pay half on my next payday (which was the following week) and the second half on the payday after. The bailiff agreed to accept £500 on my next payday and £493.13 the payday after and explained that I would need to contact him on his mobile to make the payment using a debit card.

The next day I was at work when I received a call from the bailiff to say he was in my village looking for my flat and needed directions. I asked him why he was looking for my flat and he said that he needed to post a letter through the letterbox to confirm the repayment plan that we had agreed. When I suggested that this was a little strange, he said that I had nothing to worry about, that we had made an agreement and this would be honoured, but he needed to confirm the plan in writing. Having not dealt with bailiffs before, I assumed therefore that this was the norm and gave him directions so he could post the letter.

When I got home from work I opened the letter expecting to see the repayment plan as mentioned, however it was another copy of the letter I had received previously, stating that I owed £993.13 and had 24 hours to pay. Confused, I naively assumed that he had printed the wrong letter and thought nothing more of it.

I paid the £500 and £493.13 respectively on my next two paydays - after the second payment the bailiff politely thanked me and informed me that he would send a receipt for the payments in the post within the next 2 weeks. The receipt never came but to be honest I was that relieved to have paid the balance off I wasn't bothered.

That was back in November last year. This morning I received a letter from the Council stating that I had an outstanding balance of £243.50 which needed paying in 7 days or court action would be initiated. Confident that a mistake had been made (as far as I was concerned I paid my last installment in January) I called the Council to advise them of the discrepancy.

The Council advised me that there in fact was a discrepancy of £243.50 and after going through all of my payments together, it transpires that Equita actually only paid the Council £749.63 out of the £993.13 I had paid them - they had kept £243.50 for themselves!

The guy at the Council was great and explained that bailiffs do normally take a fee, however if no home visit had been made and no goods had been collected, the fee should not be anywhere near as big as that. He advised that I contact Equita and challenge this.

Before I put pen to paper and challenge Equita on this, I just wanted to check if anyone else had encountered a similar situation? I obviously understand that a fee will be payable however don't quite understand how they can justify taking so much money without advising me of the fee and especially when I responded to their first letter immediately - on the same day in fact! I might be being incredibly naive but have I missed something here?

Apologies for the long drawn out tale but any help/advice would be very much appreciated!

Thanks

Tixy

Hi

For council tax bailiffs are allowed to charge a maximum of 2 fees for 2 house visits - totalling just under £50.
If they do not levy on your goods then any other fees are unlawful.

There is a website run by a poster on here - bailiffadviceonline which provides details of what they can charge and to start by getting written details from equita as to the fees charged - so that you can then argue against the illegal fees. I think it also has template letter.