Please contact us as soon as possible if you have difficulty making Council Tax payments. We will try to help if we can. Please do not ignore the notices we send you, as it will only make matters worse.
Reminder notice
If you miss a Council Tax payment, we will send you a reminder notice. You must pay the amount shown in the notice within 7 days.
Final notice
If you don’t pay within 7 days of the reminder notice, you will lose your right to pay in instalments. We will send you a final notice telling you to pay all of your Council Tax for the rest of the year within 7 days.
Court summons
If you don’t pay the full amount within 7 days of the final notice, you will receive a court summons. You will need to pay the whole balance of your account, including the costs incurred in issuing summons, before the court hearing date.
Liability order
If you don’t pay the full balance on the summons including the court costs before the hearing date, we will apply to the court for permission to collect the debt from you - this is known as a ‘liability order’. This will incur a cost of £115, which will be added to the amount you owe us.
Once a liability order has been awarded, we can:
- take money from your wage, salary or benefits payments until your debt is cleared (this is called an ‘attachment of earnings’ or an ‘attachment of benefits’)
- if you owe £1000 or more we can apply to court for a ‘charging order’ and ‘order of sale’ so your property can be sold to pay off what you owe
- if you owe £5000 or more we can go to court and request a bankruptcy petition, resulting in your assets being sold to cover your debts. If this action is taken, high costs are involved and you could lose your home.
- send bailiffs (‘enforcement agents’) to your home to take your goods and sell them to pay off the debt and charge you bailiff fees. We will only do this as a last resort.
- summons you back to court for a ‘means enquiry’ hearing and if it is found that you had the means to pay your Council Tax but did not pay then you could be sent to prison.
Challenging a liability order
You will receive a letter with your first summons explaining what evidence the council must provide for the court to make a liability order. The letter also explains how to challenge a liability order in court.