being taken to court for unpaid council tax, HELP!!!

tucbiscuit

ok, I'll try and explain this the best I can, basically I am being taken to court by Liverpool city council for unpaid council tax on my current residence;




but feel I have a defence and mitigating circumstances, so anyone in the know please help

the story goes; me and my gf moved into our current place on the 18/07/2007, she sent an email which I have been told was recieved by someone at the council tax offices on the 25/07/2007 stating that we had moved house and this is our new address for council tax purposes

now we didn't hear much despite numerous calls and emails

then suddenly this summons apears wanting us to attend court on 19/12/2007

now according to the girl I spoke to at the council tax office all correspondence was going to our old address until 17/11/2007 despite them having confirmed receiving the email sent by my gf on the 25/07/2007 stating our new address

on the day the summons was sent (2 days before it arrived at my house) I had, had enough and rang again and managed to set up a direct debit, unaware of the summons

I have emailed the billing manager who is apparently who I need to speak to, but do I have a case?

thanks

Voyager2002

Find out who is your local councillor (elected) and go and see them. Council officers can and do ignore ordinary people, but are answerable to councillors.

Also try to see someone at a local housing advice service (Shelter?) who may well have means of contacting managers within the council that are not available to you.

The whole story is disgraceful, and I hope that your councillor will find ways to make them give a better service in future.

CIS

I would ask to speak to a senior or principal officer who will be responsible for managing the Council Tax dept - TBH if you had rung my dept with a problem like this and it had been identified that the bills had been sent to the wrong property even after being informed then the summons would be pulled - even our front desk staff can withdraw a summons.

Does your council have a specific recovery section - some are split in to billing and recovery depts . The recovery dept is the one you need to speak to .

tucbiscuit

recovery department don't speak to people on the phone, only by letter or email which is the same with the billing manager

I rang up before and just paid the year in full to end all the annoyance and confusion, but will pursue to have the £28 court cost removed.

they make it so hard you just end up giving up even if you are in the right

olly300

tucbiscuit wrote: »

recovery department don't speak to people on the phone, only by letter or email which is the same with the billing manager

If everything is in writing then there can be no arguments over who said what, and if you do end up in court you have written proof of the incompetence of the council tax department.

If you want to make a complaint about the council tax department you should complaint to the financial director of your local council followed by councillors and your local MP in that order.

I would send the letter to the financial director by recorded delivery and if you have the names of anyone in the department who dealt with your case mention them in the letter.

I rang up before and just paid the year in full to end all the annoyance and confusion, but will pursue to have the £28 court cost removed.

they make it so hard you just end up giving up even if you are in the right

Don't give up.

I found after I made a complaint to the finacial director when my local council tax department again mucked up my bill and threaten me for non-payment, they contacted me before I received the bill in the post to apologise for their mistake.

harryhound

Something similar happened to me.
Fortunately I had evidence in writing of every step I had taken.
I telephoned the council's legal department BUT realised that the smooth talker I was put through to could be yet another jobsworth clock watcher;
SO I carefully filled in the notice of defence that came with the summons and took it round to the court in person. I then discovered that the date on the summons, that said I had 14 days to enter a defence, that was itself BACK DATED 10 days, was infact meaningless and the court clerks had but down the service date as 3 days in the future (!?!?!). The whole system stank of an out of control machine run by clock watchers who did not give a stuff about the effect they were having on the lives of ordinary people.
Well my defence did the trick, a few days later I got a curt letter simply saying the summons had been withdrawn. No sort of apology though.

The only organisation that came out of the fiasco with credit were Alliance & Leicester who did a superb job in providing me with evidence of when the payment had been made into the Council's account by first class post, within 18 hours of being asked.

My only satisfaction was seeing in the local paper, some 4 months later, that both the senior executive and his finance director had been sacked; albeit with a pay-off of our money.

If you can demonstrate mal administration (ie produce a table of repeated failure of the council to meet its performance standards for dealing with the public, rather than one isolated clerical c 0 ck up) then report it to the ombudsman. You will get modest compensation.

hodgester

the bill and the reminder were not served in line with statutory legislation as they were not sent to the billing address, as requested. Therefore the summons was not issued in accordance with the same legislation. If I were the court taking officer in Liverpool, rather than down here in the South East, I'd remove your summons like a shot. If they won't, go to court. Once they realise your defence they'll back down. If not, go in and state your case that you were not billed in line with statutory demand, and you'll walk out scot-free.

hodgester

tucbiscuit wrote: »

recovery department don't speak to people on the phone, only by letter or email which is the same with the billing manager

liverpool council obviously find the concept of public service beyond their little scouse brains. If you want your customer to pay their bills responsibly then you need to be accountable to the public you serve.

guppy

hodgester wrote: »

If you want your customer to pay their bills responsibly then you need to be accountable to the public you serve.

Well said, you rather angry council man but there's nowt wrong with scousers!