Council Tax Reduction - Manual Calculator?

Gandalf644

Is there a manual way of working out Council Tax Reduction?

I am trying to help out my neighbour with his Council Tax Reduction (CTR), which it appears the LA may have calculated wrongly and he wishes to appeal should it be incorrect.

For working out entitlement to Council Tax Reduction, the LA website reverts to the online calculators such as Turn2Us and Entitled to.

However, these do not cater for his financial circumstances. As an example, the LA now includes PIP income in the CTR calculation. None of the online calculators permits anything but the standard PIP amounts to be entered.

He receives Enhanced Rate Daily Living PIP, but only £21 per week due to overlapping. Likewise with his Enhanced Mobility which is Nil per week but cannot be entered as such.

Also, some of his War Pension supplements should be included in the calculation and some are excluded. The online calculators have ‘War Pension other rates’ but cannot distinguish between those counted and those not counted.

Hence requiring a manual calculation matrix to try to work out his correct entitlement.

So, I was wondering if there is a manual way (hopefully with a guide) to working it out using pen, paper and possibly a slide rule (remember them)?

Many thanks.

sgthammer

Technically, if you have all the information to hand it shouldn't be too difficult to work out your neighbour's CTR entitlement longhand on a piece of paper, only referring to online guides to determine which benefits count as income for different purposes. Some conversion of monthly and four-weekly amounts to daily rates and back again might be involved, but the actual arithmetic is high school stuff even if there's a lot of it.

Unfortunately you'd be wasting your time. There is no mechanism for challenging a council's in-house calculation and they can just ignore any correspondence on the matter. Should your neighbour be tempted to press the issue via even partial non-payment, court action for recovery is automatic and makes no allowance for a defence case to be presented. Ultimately, the council can even withdraw historic rebates retrospectively, leaving the CT payer in a worse position than before, again with no opportunity to defend.

In the long run your neighbour's peace of mind is better served by treating CTR as discretionary, taking his existing award as a win, and moving on with his life.

– The Voice of Experience.

fatbelly

Each council has its own scheme but the main online calculators should work out which scheme to use from the postcode and so should be accurate

If I'm wrong (as I could be) then try your local Citizens Advice and ask if they use QBC, which is a commercial product and infinitely adjustable. You will need someone to use it who knows what they are doing but you can be given a printout

SnowWhiterThanWhite

Try AGE UK calculator, i can filter to postcode & it seems pretty accurate calculating our LA scheme when it comes to HB & CTR

Yamor

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6671358/council-tax-reduction-manual-calculator

If you tell us which Council it is, we may be able to help...

Gandalf644

Thanks all.

It looks like the Royal British Legion money team are taking on his case as there is definitely a wheel off somewhere with the LA calculation.

Hopefully it will get resolved asap.

huckster

Ask for a meeting at local Council office to go through the Council Tax reduction information. Most Councils have local offices where members of the public can attend to talk about these issues. If you went with your neighbour for a prearranged appointment, I am sure you would find out the information you are looking for.