Council Tax dispute and multiple accounts!

[IanM]

Re: Council Tax dispute and multiple accounts!

Hi Cards down. No i haven't yet, I'm just working off what i already have from them so that when i do write to them i can ask them specific questions.

I may have just stumbled into what i have been looking for, evidence of corruption!

I do need answers to my questions first though so i can build a better picture of what is going on!

[cards down]

Re: Council Tax dispute and multiple accounts!

A SAR will get you all the evidence you would need I would have thought. I'm currently having problems with my local council and their collection agents. I sent the bailiff company a SAR and although they tried to worm their way out of it by telling complete lies (a letter to their CEO soon got them to comply though) I found the information very valuable. It has given me something to cross reference with and even created a few more questions I want answering.

[IanM]

Re: Council Tax dispute and multiple accounts!

As well as obtaining all the paperwork i want to ask specific questions so that the person answering them directly incriminates themselves in the allegations i will be making, someone's going down, lol

In your case all i can say is, a) check the date you were summonsed and had a liability order against you.
b) check the date the liability order was sent to the bailiffs by the council.

[IanM]

Re: Council Tax dispute and multiple accounts!

Contacted the Audit commission this morning for advice and this is their reply:-

Dear Mr M, thank you for your email.

I'm sorry to hear about the problems you've experienced with your council. Unfortunately, I'm not sure that we can be of much assistance. Our role is to appoint auditors to local authorities, those auditors then in turn look at the authorities accounts. Although the issues you have raised obviously affect how public money is being used, the amounts themselves are likely to be immaterial to the accounts. The leaflet available from the page linked below explains the role of the auditor and your rights:

http://www.audit-commission.gov.uk/a...s03072006.aspx

If you haven't done already, I would recommend making a formal complaint to the council, or potentially making a complaint about the service to the Local Government Ombudsman. (http://www.lgo.org.uk/)

If you believe that there has been a case of fraud, then as that is a criminal matter it should be referred to the Police. .

I hope this is of help.

Yours sincerely

Rob Mauler

Public Enquiries

I will be contacting the LGO this week for advice and will let you know what they say.

[outlawlgo]

Re: Council Tax dispute and multiple accounts!

If you make a formal complaint to the council they will be investigating themselves (enough said). If you submit a complaint to the LGO with allegations of fraud, they will most likely suggest you report it to the police. If you report suspected fraud about a local authority to the police, they will most likely tell you that the LGO is the appropriate organisation to contact.

It's a stitch-up.

[bluebottle]

Re: Council Tax dispute and multiple accounts!

If you make a formal complaint to the council they will be investigating themselves (enough said). If you submit a complaint to the LGO with allegations of fraud, they will most likely suggest you report it to the police. If you report suspected fraud about a local authority to the police, they will most likely tell you that the LGO is the appropriate organisation to contact.

It's a stitch-up.

No. It's called Passing the Buck. It's because no-one is absolutely sure who should investigate it.

[IanM]

Re: Council Tax dispute and multiple accounts!

The council have no intention of investigating it, i have asked them to look at this matter several times over the last 5 years and still it goes on.

All we did was ask for an amended bill to take into account we changed address, argued over the amount they said we owed and only now have i been able to produce enough evidence to show they are doing something wrong, whether they are acting illegally or not is still to be decided.

The way i see it so far is they take you to court to obtain a liability order, you can't pay the installments they ask for so they send it to the bailiffs to collect which means they can charge fees for lying and bullying people into paying what they demand, if you refuse to pay the bailiffs it gets sent back to the council who then 12 months after obtaining a liability order they will obtain an attachment of earnings order to collect what they are owed direct from your employer.

I would have thought that if they obtained a liability order, demanded unaffordable payments that were not payed they would then obtain an attachment of earnings order to collect the money as soon as possible for the related year, then there would be no reason for the bailiffs to become involved full stop.

Maybe the whole system is worked so that the attachment of earnings orders are withheld deliberately by the council so that the accounts can be referred to the bailiffs so they in turn can make some money.

That would explain why the bailiffs act the way they do in trying to collect this debt, they only have a set amount of time to collect any money before the council have to obtain an attachment of earnings order to have any legal right to claim what is owed.

I'm sure an investigation by the LGO or the police will tell us whether this is true or not but if anyone here knows anything about how the process is supposed to work i would appreciate it if they could post something here so i could work it out.

Thanks.

[bluebottle]

Re: Council Tax dispute and multiple accounts!

Hi Ian,

In my considered judgement, I feel your best course of action in the circumstances you outline in Post #22 is to refer the matter to the LGO for investigation. If the LGO considers it merits involving the police, they will inform you or, possibly, alert the police themselves. It will depend on what they find that will determine what action is taken.

BB

[alham]

Re: Council Tax dispute and multiple accounts!

Have you written to the council leader, ccing financial officer, council tax office, local councillor and MP? A nice to the point letter explaining your position, steps you've taken and response from their officers may stir the hornets nest. And in the future, every letter you write regarding this matter cc the leader, MP and local councillor AND MAKE sure that these cc are clearly visible on the letter. It's amazing how quickly little hitlers start to play ball when higher powers are invoked.

[IanM]

Re: Council Tax dispute and multiple accounts!

More evidence of wrongdoing with regards to the council tax?

This is copied word for word from the letter from the council dated 30.11.2010.

Account No.1:- There is one attachment of earnings order running with another one on hold and we are recovering £56 per month.

Account No.2:- The 2011 amount is subject to an attachment of earnings order and we are receiving approximately £36.80 per month. The 2010 debt is currently at Rossendales Bailiffs since 12.07.11. As a result of my query, Revenues have contacted Rossendale Bailiffs who confirmed that they have been trying to contact the customer since 2010 to try and get the 2010/11 LO dated 16.06.10 paid. The debt is still £1048.84(a full years charge plus £42.50 bailiffs charges. The only money they have received are from the attachment of earnings, there have been no direct payments. Revenues have asked for Rossendales to hold any recovery action for 1 week to give the customer time to contact them.

[IanM]

Re: Council Tax dispute and multiple accounts!

I find it strange that nobody has made a comment about my last post regarding what the council have told me with regards to the AEO's so its time to point out why i believe i have multiple account numbers for my CT and why they are able to collect payments on 2 AEO's at the same time.


""The only money they have received are from the attachment of earnings, there have been no direct payments.""


It would seem that the council are collecting a payment on one account number and receiving the payments direct from the employer, and the bailiffs are collecting payments on an AEO from the employer on the other account number, this would certainly explain why despite almost 2 years worth of payments via AEO's my account balances are not being reduced as they should be.

At this moment that would indicate that they must have also altered the AEO for the 2nd account so that the employer pays the 2nd account direct to the bailiffs because on an AEO it clearly states that any deductions made have to be paid direct to the Finance department of the local town hall so, unless the AEO has been illegally amended, any payments should be made direct to the council.

According to PART VI Regulation 42:-

"""42.—(1) Where an employer would, but for this paragraph, be obliged under regulation 37(3) to make deductions on any pay-day under two or more attachment of earnings orders made under this Part, he shall make deductions only with respect to the one which was made first until it ceases to be in force, and shall then deal with the other order or orders in like manner in the order in which they were made.

Please feel free to tell me if i am wrong.

[IanM]

Re: Council Tax dispute and multiple accounts!

Thanks to everyone on here giving me the opportunity to discuss my problems with CT and Bailiffs, and giving some good advice and pointers, I have managed to work out a strategy for solving all my issues CT and intend to send a SAR to the council before i do anything else so could someone please provide me with the appropriate SAR to send, thank you!

Also, i have a summons to appear in the magistrates on the 20th June and need some advice before i go to court.

If i attend court and the judge awards a Liability Order against me, am I allowed to ask the judge any questions regarding the LO?

If so, can i get a copy of the court record(transcript) of my question and the answer given by the judge?

Does the judge even have to answer my questions?

Once i know the answers to these questions i may be able to draft the right questions to ask in court.

Thank you.

[outlawlgo]

Re: Council Tax dispute and multiple accounts!

I went to one of these liability order hearings. The first two or three posts might give you a bit of an insight....

Liability order hearing at Grimsby Magistrates' court

[IanM]

Re: Council Tax dispute and multiple accounts!

Thanks outlawlgo.

Having read your account of attending court i can see the problem i may have but i intend to take the council to county court to claim against them for the way they have conducted themselves and how their failings have caused us financial penalties that we should not have incurred but i'm not going to contest the LO, i have something a bit different in mind.

The one thing i read that more than caught my interest is the following statement:-

"""they must use bailiffs extensively as the volume is too high to look at each case in enough detail and take other, more time consuming or expensive actions for all these cases. Council staff have also suggested using AEOs would be better if they were allowed access to Inland Revenue (IR) records (see section 3.5.3.3)."""


The reason for this is when the council have obtained a LO, they send you a liability order form requesting your financial details, on this form you have to state your income/outgoings/your offer of payment and..............your employers name and address!

This is BEFORE they refer your account to the bailiffs!!! So, to say, it would be better if they had access to the IR records is nothing but a blatant lie, something more is going on here, have a think about it and bounce your thoughts around on here!

[IanM]

Re: Council Tax dispute and multiple accounts!

I have just sent this to the LGO as a general inquiry, may take until the end of the week to get a response but I'm happy to wait!


"""I have a general question with regards to The Council Tax (Administration and Enforcement) Regulations 1992 and was hoping somebody may be able to tell me the purpose of this document.

If i was to take this document at face value and have reason to use this document for a legal process would i have to follow each step contained in each part in the order they are set out in that document?

Many thanks for your help with this inquiry."""


I may have more questions for them, depending on what they reply if anything at all!