Summary: We shall not investigate this complaint about the Council adding the empty property premium to Mr X’s council tax. This is mainly because the Council has recently removed the extra council tax and Mr X considers the matter closed.

The complaint

1. Mr X complained about how the Council has added the empty property premium (EPP) to his council tax. This has doubled his council tax.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word ‘fault’ to refer to these. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint. I refer to this as ‘injustice’. We provide a free service but must use public money carefully. We may decide not to start or continue with an investigation if we believe it is unlikely we would find fault. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended)
3. The law says we cannot normally investigate a complaint when someone can appeal to a tribunal. However, we may decide to investigate if we consider it would be unreasonable to expect the person to appeal. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(a), as amended)
4. The Valuation Tribunal deals with appeals against decisions on council tax liability and council tax support or reduction.

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How I considered this complaint

5. I considered information provided by Mr X. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code. I shared my draft decision with Mr X and considered his comments on it.

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My assessment

6. Mr X bought a property in September 2018. If a property is empty for longer than two years, the Council charges extra council tax. This is the empty property premium (EPP). In September 2020 the Council began charging Mr X the EPP.
7. Mr X’s complaint to us suggested the Council was wrong in saying the property has been empty for two years. He said the Council did not supply evidence of when it believed the property was empty and he wanted such evidence.
8. This point related to whether the Council correctly calculated the overall council tax Mr X owed. The Valuation Tribunal can consider that, so the restriction described in paragraph 3 applies. I therefore sent Mr X a draft decision explaining this and saying I considered it would be reasonable to expect Mr X to appeal to the Valuation Tribunal if he believed the Council’s calculation was incorrect in terms of any period where it had added the EPP.
9. Mr X’s complaint to us also suggested the Council’s addition of the EPP meant the Council was charging him extra council tax for the period 2018 to 2020 when he had already paid what the Council demanded during that time. However, the copy council tax bill Mr X sent us showed the Council only added the EPP to the Council Tax from September 2020 onwards, not before. So my draft decision also said the evidence did not suggest the Council wrongly backdated the extra charge.
10. Mr X replied to my draft decision. He disagreed with my draft findings but added that the Council had now removed the EPP after he showed it the property had never been empty. He stated he now considered the matter closed.
11. As the matter is now resolved, I need not take further action.

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Final decision

12. We shall not investigate this complaint because it is now resolved.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman