Council tax demand - 16 years later!

Taucher

Hello all,

Today my friend got a council tax demand (from a London borough) for 6 months non payment of tax from April - September 2006 (!). The letter he received was to his current address but listed him, another friend and me. All of us lived at the address the council is trying to get the council tax from at the disputed time (2005-2006). The bill includes £200 court fee. I usually think that any debt is correct but we are all flummoxed by this and it seems highly unlikely that we didnt pay council tax for six months. We all moved to different places but stayed in the borough for years after - I lived in the same borough and paid council tax at two different addresses for a further 7 years but got no reminders or notifications. 

I assume that they cannot chase this debt now as 16 years have passed. Also, none of us have a CCJ or anything against us or on our records. We are thinking of asking the council if they could prove that they sent us letters at the time - it seems incredibly unlikely that we didnt pay and even less likely that we would have ignored all the letters we would have (should have) subsequently received. 

Any insights?

theartfullodger

I don't think that the normal 6 years limit on debts applies to council tax (but not certain).  Certainly doesn't to benefits debts (also to government, central or local)


Be careful, council tax debts are afaik the only debt you can go to jail for.

The safe option is to pay today "under protest" make sure those words are in email or payment) then argue later.  That way you prevent any further fees or charges clocking up.

Andthen07

Have they made contact during those 16 years?

Taken from a website:

Your council tax arrears will be statute-barred after six years but it’s highly unlikely that your council will let that happen. 

They will definitely keep contacting you if you have council tax arrears and you refuse to acknowledge your debts and make payments towards them, your local council will most likely take legal action against you. 

If your local council does not contact you in regards to your debts for over six years, you can definitely dispute their claims if they ask you for council tax payments after that period. 

Again, I will reiterate that it’s highly unlikely that your local council will let your debt slide without asking for a council tax payment for six years. 

powerful_Rogue

Andthen07 said:

Have they made contact during those 16 years?

Taken from a website:

Your council tax arrears will be statute-barred after six years but it’s highly unlikely that your council will let that happen. 

They will definitely keep contacting you if you have council tax arrears and you refuse to acknowledge your debts and make payments towards them, your local council will most likely take legal action against you. 

If your local council does not contact you in regards to your debts for over six years, you can definitely dispute their claims if they ask you for council tax payments after that period. 

Again, I will reiterate that it’s highly unlikely that your local council will let your debt slide without asking for a council tax payment for six years. 

Don't just rely on any website.

OP, the £200 court costs, any more details on that? Could be that the council have applied for a liability order. If they have, then there is no time limit on enforcing the debt.

Andthen07

powerful_Rogue said:

Andthen07 said:

Have they made contact during those 16 years?

Taken from a website:

Your council tax arrears will be statute-barred after six years but it’s highly unlikely that your council will let that happen. 

They will definitely keep contacting you if you have council tax arrears and you refuse to acknowledge your debts and make payments towards them, your local council will most likely take legal action against you. 

If your local council does not contact you in regards to your debts for over six years, you can definitely dispute their claims if they ask you for council tax payments after that period. 

Again, I will reiterate that it’s highly unlikely that your local council will let your debt slide without asking for a council tax payment for six years. 

Don't just rely on any website.

OP, the £200 court costs, any more details on that? Could be that the council have applied for a liability order. If they have, then there is no time limit on enforcing the debt.

Well council tax does fall under debt that can be statute barred after 6 years. 

Source Stepchange.org. Is that OK for you ?

Taucher

Below is the relevant part of the letter. This was received yesterday and dated 22nd of January 2022. None of us have any CCJs on our accounts. Admittedly none of us remember our set up at this time but we all stayed in the borough and are certain we didnt receive any letters about this in the years afterwards. Court costs are actually £95 not the £200 I quoted earlier. 

We dont know if the court costs were incurred at the time or if this is a recent thing. And we dont know what 'less payments' means although it seems to indicate that a payment has been made which we are all pretty sure this hasnt happened. 

SiliconChip

I would recommend that you re-post (or ask for this thread to be moved) in the Cutting Tax board, where it will hopefully be seen by @CIS who is an expert in this area and will be able to offer you responses that you can rely on, rather than trying to work out which of the conflicting information given so far is correct.

lincroft1710

That bill looks fairly straight forward, The amount for the period of occupation is £602.34, they have applied to the court for a liability order, hence court costs of £95. This totals £697.34 owed by you, but you have paid £122.31, so the total amount currently owed by you is £575.03.


If you were in rented accommodation I would wager your tenancy said "Council Tax included" and the landlord didn't pay or stopped paying the CT, so the council are correctly chasing you and your co-occupiers.


If you were renting a self contained flat on a single tenancy agreement (rather than individual tenancies) then the landlord is not liable for CT, but you are as joint tenants

CIS

Andthen07 said:

powerful_Rogue said:

Andthen07 said:

Have they made contact during those 16 years?

Taken from a website:

Your council tax arrears will be statute-barred after six years but it’s highly unlikely that your council will let that happen. 

They will definitely keep contacting you if you have council tax arrears and you refuse to acknowledge your debts and make payments towards them, your local council will most likely take legal action against you. 

If your local council does not contact you in regards to your debts for over six years, you can definitely dispute their claims if they ask you for council tax payments after that period. 

Again, I will reiterate that it’s highly unlikely that your local council will let your debt slide without asking for a council tax payment for six years. 

Don't just rely on any website.

OP, the £200 court costs, any more details on that? Could be that the council have applied for a liability order. If they have, then there is no time limit on enforcing the debt.

Well council tax does fall under debt that can be statute barred after 6 years. 

Source Stepchange.org. Is that OK for you ?

Stepchange have simplified it to the point of almost being wrong.

They have 6 years to obtain a liability order from when the debt becomes due but once an order has been obtained, it remains in place until otherwise discharged.

What people also tend to forget is that council tax is a fluid system, so if they find out this week that a 10-year-old calculation is wrong then a new bill could be issued on Monday, and the 6 years starts from then

CIS

Taucher said:

Below is the relevant part of the letter. This was received yesterday and dated 22nd of January 2022. None of us have any CCJs on our accounts. Admittedly none of us remember our set up at this time but we all stayed in the borough and are certain we didnt receive any letters about this in the years afterwards. Court costs are actually £95 not the £200 I quoted earlier. 

We dont know if the court costs were incurred at the time or if this is a recent thing. And we dont know what 'less payments' means although it seems to indicate that a payment has been made which we are all pretty sure this hasnt happened. 

Without investigating further, it's impossible to tell from that whether you had an actual liability for the period. It may or may not be correct.

There would be no CCJ for council tax as they don't use them.