Unfair council tax for bungalows

fairness2024

I live in a small, two bedroom bungalow in Croydon with one bathroom, classed as Band E.

I tried challenging this with the appropriate body years ago but it was rejected as the same type of properties in my area are all classed as Band E.  This is also the same band for some 4 bedroom properties in the area, how can this be right?

Now that the single occupant 25% discount is under threat, more and more pensioners are going to be affected. Can anything be done about this?

FlorayG

Oh the whole thing is a total mess but none of the parties up for election were even remotely interested in updating it. If you've already appealed there's nothing more you can do. I'm in a similar situation, half the bungalows in my street are band C and others are band D and I can't see any difference between them but my appeal was rejected as well

beckstar1975

@fairness2024 depends where on Croydon you are though - there are some lovely bungalows with substantial grounds that absolutely would be band E - many of which are sadly being bought, demolished and replaced with flats. 

tacpot12

You could complain to you MP or start a campaign to get the system improved. 

molerat

I've got an idea.  How about making people pay a local tax.  Houses don't use local resources, people do.  Every adult in the area would pay their share.  It would likely be cheaper for most adults.  Wouldn't that be fairer than the current system ?  No doubt you would get complaints from the usual ones who don't like paying a fair share for anything though.  Just got to think of a name for it now

FlorayG

molerat said:

I've got an idea.  How about making people pay a local tax.  Houses don't use local resources, people do.  Every adult in the area would pay their share.  It would likely be cheaper for most adults.  Wouldn't that be fairer than the current system ?  No doubt you would get complaints from the usual ones who don't like paying a fair share for anything though.  Just got to think of a name for it now

OMG I so remember that - because I lived in a one room wooden house with no services except electricity and a standpipe in the garden. No sewage, no post delivery, no bin collection. I lived on the Gower, which was the MOST EXPENSIVE POLL TAX AREA IN WALES and I had to pay the whole amount because of my postcode

tacpot12

Rather than change the system of council tax, it would be sufficeint to improve the fairness by making sure that houses were properly rated. Personally, I'd like to see the EPC rating taking into account as a means of encouraging energy efficiency improvements, but that would need every house to have an EPC.

molerat

tacpot12 said:

Rather than change the system of council tax, it would be sufficeint to improve the fairness by making sure that houses were properly rated. Personally, I'd like to see the EPC rating taking into account as a means of encouraging energy efficiency improvements, but that would need every house to have an EPC.

I don't think adding another seriously flawed complexity to the current flawed system would really help.

lincroft1710

tacpot12 said:

Rather than change the system of council tax, it would be sufficeint to improve the fairness by making sure that houses were properly rated. Personally, I'd like to see the EPC rating taking into account as a means of encouraging energy efficiency improvements, but that would need every house to have an EPC.

Absolute non starter.

lincroft1710

fairness2024 said:

I live in a small, two bedroom bungalow in Croydon with one bathroom, classed as Band E.

I tried challenging this with the appropriate body years ago but it was rejected as the same type of properties in my area are all classed as Band E.  This is also the same band for some 4 bedroom properties in the area, how can this be right?

Now that the single occupant 25% discount is under threat, more and more pensioners are going to be affected. Can anything be done about this?

If your bungalow was worth £90,000 as at 1 April 1991 and a nearby 4 bed house was worth £119,500 then both would correctly be in Band E 

fairness2024

I just think that the way property was valued in the first place was wrong. I heard from neighbours, who were around at the time, that the assessors stood at the end of the road and classed all the properties the same band. I believe having a larger than average garden made a difference to the original banding but, in my opinion, that is not as important as living space; accommodating more adults.