Reminder notices
If you miss a council tax instalment you will get a reminder notice giving you seven days to bring your instalments up-to-date. If you fail to make a payment within this time, then you are at risk of receiving a court summons. Making a payment, but then later receiving a second reminder for a subsequent missed instalment, will again require payment within seven days to avoid a summons. No further reminders would be issued, so if you fall behind with your payments again, you will have to pay the full outstanding balance of your annual bill. Any balance not paid at that stage, or within seven days of receiving any final notice, would be followed by a summons - unless you have been in touch with us and alternative arrangements have been agreed.
Court summons
When the council issues a summons it is applying to the magistrates' court for a liability order. You will be sent a summons telling you when the court will consider the application and the amount the council are seeking to recover. This will include the outstanding amount of the council tax and the cost to the council of making the application.
You do not need to attend court, contact council tax if you need more time to pay the amount due, or if you are expecting the amount to be reduced by a discount or council tax support entitlement - we will try to come to a reasonable arrangement with you for payment, or agree a temporary hold on the liability order while other matters are checked and resolved. If you make an arrangement and keep to it, you will avoid further action and costs being incurred.
If you have received a council tax summons, you can email us. You will not be seen in person at the court hearing unless you have previously contacted the council tax office to discuss your account.
Liability order
If a liability order is obtained at the magistrates' court, an enforcement warning notice will be sent to you to confirm. The notice explains the enforcement action that may be taken to recover the outstanding council tax.
If you are unable to pay the amount outstanding in full, you must supply the information requested in the notice. We will then contact you to confirm if we can accept an arrangement, which would normally be by direct debit.
Do not ignore the notice. Failure to contact council tax will result in the council using one of the following enforcement methods to collect the outstanding council tax:
Enforcement agents
Your account may be passed to enforcement agents used by the council.
Once your account has been passed to the enforcement agents, you will start incurring fees and will need to contact the enforcement company directly to arrange a payment plan to avoid the enforcement agents visiting your property with the intention of removing your belongings for sale at auction to clear your outstanding council tax.
The fees you could incur (under Schedule 12 of the Taking Control of Goods Regulations 2013) are:
- Compliance stage - £75 (this will apply in all cases)
- Enforcement stage - £235 minimum (plus 7.5% of any amount above £1,500)
- Sale of goods stage - £110 minimum (plus 7.5% of any amount above £1,500)
Attachment of earnings
An order may be sent to your employer to make deductions directly from your wages to pay your council tax. The amount deducted is a percentage of your daily/weekly/monthly wages and differs depending on the amount you earn. The percentages are set by central government.
Read this important information if you have already been sent an attachment of earnings order
Deductions from DWP benefits
If you are in receipt of income support, job seekers allowance, employment and support allowance or pension credits, an order may be issued to the Department for Work and Pensions requesting they make deductions from your benefits to clear the council tax balance.
Bankruptcy/liquidation
If you owe council tax of £5,000 or more, insolvency proceedings may be started against you in accordance with the Insolvency Act 1986, as amended.
These proceedings may be either bankruptcy proceedings against an individual or winding up proceedings against a limited company.
Charging order
If you owe council tax of £1,000 or more and own the property, the council may apply to the county court or the High Court for a charging order. Once the order is granted the council will be able to enforce the sale of the property in order to clear the council tax owed.
Committal to prison
If your council tax remains outstanding after enforcement agents have tried to recover the debt, the council may apply to the magistrates' court for a warrant committing you to prison. The court will hold a means enquiry to decide if the outstanding debt is due to your wilful refusal or culpable neglect. If so, they may commit you to prison for a maximum of three months. The court may decide to postpone the period of imprisonment on certain conditions, normally relating to payment of the debt over a period of time.
Fo more information, read Ealing's council tax debt recovery policy.