Incompetent Council Tax Officials

Poppy9

IvanOpinion wrote:

This one is easy to solve ... you made the mistake Bossyboots ... you creditted someone that works for the council with intelligence ... as soon as you do that they are guaranteed to prove you wrong

Ivan

Hey I work for the council and I do a blooming good job Say that again and I will :wall:

Sadly I have to agree that some of my Local Govt colleagues are not in the right job.

Back to your problem.

Go in and visit them. All council tax offices should be open to the public. Take in all your evidence and sit with them while they update their figures. At the start of the interview ask for their name and their position(they might refuse full name as council tax and Housing benefit staff have been attacked etc). Make them repeat back to you all the critical conclusions from the informatin and make notes. If you are leaving photocopies with them mark them (take a red pen) with comments agreed on. If when they have reworked the figures and you do not agree with them write directly to the Director of Finance (you should get his/her name from the council website - they usually are www.councilname.gov.uk) or alternatively each council should have a complaints officer - again should be on website or just ring switchboard and ask to speak to the corporate complaints officer.

In my own dealings with the Council I work for I have made complaints to the corporate complaints officer and I have had issues sorted out usually the same day. If they fail to sort ask for a copy of their offical complaint procedure. This will tell you how to involve ombudsman if necessary.

Don't be fobbed off if you know you are right. Don't get annoyed and shout as its harder for them to end a conversation with a calm reasonable person if it's not going their way

You should remember that local govt officers deal with many deceitful clients so systems are in place to catch those. Unfortunately for honest citizens it's offensive to have their honesty questoned.

Good luck.

IvanOpinion

Poppy9 wrote:

Hey I work for the council and I do a blooming good job Say that again and I will :wall:

Put em up ... put em up ... I'll fight you with one hand behind my back

Ivan

Bossyboots

Thanks for your responses. I am worried that if I complain at this point, they will simply hold back looking at the paperwork again out of spite.

I did think of going into the office (they have a dedicated benefits section open during the day) but this is already taking up a lot of time and I have not really had a chance to do so. I am going to try to get in this week though as I am off work. I have remained calm and polite with them as I know from my own job that you get far better results that way.

I am grateful for the suggestions about who to complain to. The e-mail address for complaints to our council goes straight to the benefits office so I will ring the switchboard and ask for details of their complaints procedure and who to send it to.

If they had simply put their hands up and said okay, we've made a mistake and put it right, I would not have minded but not only are they not making any effort to put it right quickly, they are (in my opinion) now seeking to cover their tracks by throwing up other questions. When my mum first appealed they amended one period in which the income calculations were wrong but they seem unable to get over this mental block on the savings. I have double checked the paperwork because they have got me doubting myself but the evidence is clearly there as to what figures were where and when and what they added up to.

I have no problem with them checking that the claim is genuine. I am the first in line to denounce fraudulent claimants. I would also have not had any problem right back at the beginning if they had queried the withdrawal of the two sums of money as it is entirely reasonable that they should check this was not a deliberate attempt to reduce her means. It is their failure to read a buiding society passbook correctly on three occasions and their refusal to simply own up to it that I object most strongly to.

Poppy9

IvanOpinion wrote:

Put em up ... put em up ... I'll fight you with one hand behind my back

Ivan

You and who's army

Bossyboots

At last, I have received a response. Just as their deadline ran out!

They have now sent a recalculation for the periods in question and surprise, surprise no council tax is payable. There was no letter of explanation and no apology. If there had have been, I might have let matters go but as it stands I will be making a formal complaint.

I can't get hold of my mum to tell her the good news but she will be so relieved.

Maisie

Bossyboots wrote:

I am so angry I just have to vent this somewhere.

My mum received a reassessent of her council tax benefit in July at they stated that for a six month period last year her savings were over the threshold. I knew this could not be true so I spent a whole Saturday putting her figures into a spreadsheet, getting statements together and composing a letter.

Over a month later I have now received a reply, the contents of which defy understanding. I have only received this after chasing them up.

Because the letter did not make sense, I have telephoned them. After much difficulty getting them to comprehend the basics, I asked them to pick a month in the period and give me their figures and tell me which accounts they were referring to. It became clear that they had taken the opening figure of her Nationwide passbook and applied that across the board but only for those six months. As this account fed her ISA, she was credited for several thousand pounds she did not have. What they have not looked at is the fact that since the end of 2003 there has been less than £400 in the account but oh no, they don't appear to be able to read the dates on the side of a passbook.

This is the second time they have been asked to review the figures and still got it wrong. The lady I spoke to agreed there was a mistake and is going to have it reviewed again.

I just cannot believe people in such an important position of determining what benefits someone gets can do something so incompetent, not once, but three times.

BB check your mum's council tax banding https://www.voa.gov.uk . She may be entitled to a rebate from previous years if she's on the wrong banding.
(That's if you can stand the aggro!)

There's another thread running on Council tax (different story to yours). I don't know how to link it.