Interesting Council Tax Problem

john800

I'm having a rather interesting and frustrating problem with my council tax at the moment. Back in 2018 I purchased a 2 bed terrace house with the intention of refurbishing it. Things haven't exactly gone to plan and with my doing as much of the work as possible myself combined with the problems of getting workmen in for other things during a pandemic has meant that it is still not finished.

This has meant that my council is charging me a premium due to it being empty for over two years. This is normal practice for long term un-occupied properties and by and large I agree with the policy. However my council is not charging me the 100% premium for the house being unoccupied for between two and five years, but are charging me a 200% premium for it being unoccupied for more than five years. As I've only owned the property for two years (and a bit) myself this seems exceptionally unfair to me. The reason I have been given is that for a long term unoccupied property an new owner is given a 'grace' period of two years after which it will revert to the longer term of its total unoccupancy. 

Here's where it gets interesting - My Neighbours tell me that prior to my purchasing the property it was only empty for about 9 months not the three years it would need to be for me to now be getting charged the extra premium.

I can only guess that the previous occupants were defaulting on their council tax and the councils records have taken that as the property being unoccupied.

Can anybody tell me where I stand on this as it would seem that I'm basically being asked to pay for the previous owners council tax arrears, and as you can imagine dealing with the council tax enquiry service is like talking to a brick wall! 

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

oldbikebloke

correct, a change in ownership does NOT RESET THE CLOCK 

the principle being that property is supposed to be occupied, if it it isn't, then penalty rates are applied to "encourage" the owner to "sort  it out"

john800

Thanks for your input 'oldbikebloke' and I know the post was a bit long winded but I did say that by and large I agree with the policy.

My problem is not that I'm being charged a premium but that I'm being charged THE WRONG premium.

Who decides how long a property has been empty for?
What criteria are used to arrive at that decision?
And what if any right of appeal does a person have against it?

macman

Unless an inspection took place, the LA can only rely on the records they hold and any declaration made by the previous owner, which in this case, tell them that the property was unoccupied for 3 years.  The basis for that would be the annual CT return. If that was false, then unfortunately I can see no way that you can prove it. I don't see any connection with your suspicion of 'arrears owed', as the subsequent owner has no liability for that.
The 'clock not reset' clause was presumably introduced to avoid developers flipping properties between themselves (e.g. transferring the property to a relative) in order to avoid paying CT on empty properties that they had not yet commenced developing.
After 3 years, I think your best hope is to push on and complete the renovation as soon as you can, or sell it on to another developer who can.