Council Tax banding

LEW100

Part of the challenging your banding process is to check you neighbours’ banding. What if you think that they are all too high ? How can you use this as evidence when they are all the same property and band but too high ? Also only 2 out of 29 properties have been re-evaluated although many have been sold over the 25 years since being built. Can I just rely on the valuation as at 1991 as my evidence ?

Thanks for any input 

lincroft1710

Why do you think the bands are too high? If you have evidence which leads you to believe this (other than House Price Indices or Zoopla/Rightmove estimates neither of which would normally not be considered) then this should be your starting point. If you have no other evidence you are going to struggle. Try looking in the area for other houses of a similar age, type and size and see what their bands are.


Although a CT band is reviewed following alterations to and a subsequent sale of the property, a band increase will not always be justified.

LEW100

Probably haven’t got much of a case then as my reasoning is price. My house new in Sept 1997 was £84500 and I paid £108000 in Oct 1999. When I work that back to 1991 prices it is below the band E threshold of 88k. On the govt website the houses on my side all have their valuations stated as their purchase prices and are all band E. When you work back their prices they too come out as band D. Two houses opposite which were built after mine were more expensive and slightly larger are band D as are some round the corner wheres others are band E. 
The dates on the govt website indicate there has been only 2 re-evaluations regardless of whether they might or might not change) which should happen when they are sold or altered. Or is the data on the govt website wrong ?
I suppose I’m a little worried about using the band D properties as the reason and then they get raised to band E which wouldn’t make me very popular ! 

lincroft1710

Which govt website is quoting "valuations as their purchase prices".


The dates on the govt website indicate there has been only 2 re-evaluations regardless of whether they might or might not change) which should happen when they are sold or altered. Or is the data on the govt website wrong ?


The above does not make sense. If there is an effective date later than the date the house was built then this would indicate a band change.


The 1997 and 1999 sale prices are not conclusive as to whether D or E is correct. There is a possibility that the Band D properties were reduced from Band E

LEW100

The point was that the ‘effective date’ listed for example for my neighbour’s house is the date it was built - 27th September 1997 and the band is E so it has not changed even though it has been sold 4 times.

The website is tax.service.gov.uk where you can check bands for a given postcode

lincroft1710

LEW100 said:

The point was that the ‘effective date’ listed for example for my neighbour’s house is the date it was built - 27th September 1997 and the band is E so it has not changed even though it has been sold 4 times.

The website is tax.service.gov.uk where you can check bands for a given postcode

"tax.service.gov.uk" does not appear to exist. The website for checking your CT band is

 https://www.gov.uk/council-tax-bands.


It doesn't matter how many times a property is sold, the CT band would only be reviewed  if alterations had been carried out prior to the last sale. The word "Yes" against the Improvement Indicator in the Property Information section would indicate alterations had been carried out since the last sale.