Summary: We will not investigate this complaint about council tax recovery action. There is not enough evidence of fault in the Council’s communications and anyway any fault would not directly have caused a significant injustice. Miss X can appeal to the Valuation Tribunal about her council tax liability for the period she was a student.

The complaint

1. Miss X complains the Council sent council tax correspondence to the wrong address. She says this deprived her of the opportunity to pay the council tax before enforcement agents became involved and charged extra costs.

Back to top

The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. The Ombudsman investigates complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service but must use public money carefully. We do not start or may decide not to continue with an investigation if we decide there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating, or any fault has not caused injustice to the person who complained. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6))
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) The Valuation Tribunal deals with appeals against decisions on council tax liability.

Back to top

How I considered this complaint

4. I considered information provided by the complainant and copy complaint correspondence from the Council.
5. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

Back to top

My assessment

6. The Council says Miss X owes £591.27 council tax for a previous address. It says in 2016 and 2018 it sent bills and reminders to the last address it had for Miss X (where she no longer lived), then got court orders. As that is the normal procedure for unpaid council tax, I see no reason to doubt it happened. It would be disproportionate to try to investigate events several years ago now. The Council says enforcement agents could not trace Miss X then. It also says Miss X knew in 2019 that she owed council tax from the previous as it was mentioned in email correspondence about a previous complaint.
7. In September 2020 the Council traced Miss X’s current address and sent a bill for the old debt to the current address. Miss X acknowledges receiving such a bill in late 2020 and the Council says she telephoned it but did not arrange payment. The Council has also supplied a copy of a bill for the old debt dated 8 July 2021 and addressed to Miss X’s current address. After receiving no contact or payment, the Council passed the debt to enforcement agents, who contacted Miss X. Involving enforcement agents added £385 costs to the bill.
8. Miss X says she then telephoned the Council and was told that in April 2021 the Council had sent letters about the debt but had sent them to her old address. Miss X says she presumed those letters were reminders the Council would normally send before passing a debt to enforcement agents. So she believes she lost the opportunity to know about the bill and arrange payment before extra costs were added. The Council says it does not record calls, the note of the call does not show the Council said what Miss X says, and it disputes it sent letters to the old address after September 2020.
9. We shall not be able to establish clearly enough what happened during the call. Moreover, regardless of what might have happened in April 2021 and regardless of what Miss X might have been told on the telephone, the evidence satisfies me on balance that Miss X knew by late 2020 at the latest that the Council was seeking payment of council tax from her old address. So she had the opportunity to arrange to pay. As the Council had written to Miss X about the debt and obtained court orders several years earlier, there was no requirement to send reminders and warnings again.
10. Therefore there is not enough evidence of fault by the Council. Nor did any fault directly deprive Miss X of the opportunity to know about and pay the bill, because she already knew the Council was seeking payment.
11. Miss X also says she was a student so exempt from council tax for some of the period the Council wants her to pay for. Miss X can appeal to the Valuation Tribunal on this point so the restriction in paragraph 3 applies. It would be reasonable to appeal because the Valuation Tribunal has the expertise to decide such matters and can make binding decisions.

Back to top

Final decision

12. We will not investigate Miss X’s complaint because there is insufficient evidence of fault in the Council’s communications with her and even if there was fault, it would not have caused a direct significant injustice. It is reasonable to expect Miss X to appeal if she believes she was not liable for council tax as she was a student.

Back to top

Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman