If you are finding it difficult to pay on time, don't wait for notices to be sent – contact us as soon as possible and we will try to make alternative arrangements with you to help you pay off your bill.
More details about payment arrangements
By law Council Tax is payable in ten monthly instalments from April to January - the number of instalments is reduced if the bill is sent out later in the year. If any payment is not made by the due date a legal process begins to recover the money owing.
Council Tax Bill
The first notice of payment we will send you is a council tax bill.
This will tell you how much you owe and what to pay and when. Instalment payments are due on the 1st of the month. If you decide to pay by direct debit you can have a choice of payment dates and periods. You may now set up a direct debit instruction over the phone by calling us on (01325) 388373.
If you don't pay your instalments on time you may be sent one or more of the following notices.
Reminder Letter
Will be sent the first time a payment is overdue and will ask you to bring your payments up to date within seven days.
The letter is not part of the legal process - it is sent purely as a reminder to give you the chance to bring your account up date or raise any problems with us before more formal action is taken.
Generally, we will only send you one reminder letter in any one year.
Reminder Notice
Will be sent if:
- you do not bring your payments up to date after a reminder letter, or
- your payments get behind again.
You must bring your instalments up to date within seven days including any additional instalment that may become due in those seven days.
If your payments are not completely up to date after seven days, you will have lost your right to pay in instalments for the rest of the year.
If this happens, you would then have seven more days to pay the full amount.
After two reminder notices, if payment falls behind again, the right to pay by instalments will be automatically lost without another notice being sent and the full amount will be due.
Final Notice
Will be sent if you have;
- lost your right to pay by instalments after being sent a reminder notice but have not paid the full amount
- made a special payment arrangement but your payments are not up to date (reminder letters / notices will not be sent first)
- unpaid arrears from the previous year.
Payment of the full amount will have to be made within seven days.
Court Summons
Will be sent If you do not pay the full balance after a final notice has been sent to you.
Costs would be added to your account at this stage and included in the summons amount.
A summons will include information about what to do about the court hearing.
To avoid a court hearing the summons amount would have to be paid in full before the hearing date.
We will not normally make payment arrangements at this stage but it may be possible to do so once there has been a court hearing.
Notice of Liability Order & Request for Information
These will be sent to you if a summons is not paid in full before the court date, in which case the Court will make a Liability Order for the council tax arrears and the costs.
A Liability Order confirms the amount of debt for which enforcement action may be taken – it will include additional costs which will be awarded by the Court.
Once a Liability Order is made against you, you can be asked to provide details about yourself, including your employer, earnings and any other income. These details are asked for through the Request for Information form.
You must provide this information unless you make full payment within 14 days.
The Request for Information form would also ask for your proposals to pay off the arrears and, if acceptable, you would be able to pay off the arrears without any further action being taken.
Enforcement Action
If you did not make acceptable proposals for payment or did not keep up to date with the payments, any of the following actions could be taken to recover the debt;
- Attachment of Earnings
- Deduction from Income Support / Job Seekers Allowance / Pension Credit
- Bankruptcy
- Charging Order
- Bailiff
- Committal to Prison
Before we take any enforcement measure we will notify you beforehand and tell you how much you owe. You will be able to stop the enforcement action by making full payment within 14 days.
If you cannot pay in full within 14 days you should contact us without delay. It may be possible to agree a payment arrangement with us in which case the enforcement action would be suspended as long as you paid as arranged.
We would expect you to complete a Request for Information form before we agree to any payment arrangement.
Once enforcement action is taken, we will not normally cancel it unless you make full payment. Many of the enforcement measures will result in additional costs being added to the amount of the debt.
Further Help
If you have financial problems and difficulties paying other bills as well as council tax we strongly advise you get independent, free advice from a recognised provider such as the Citizens Advice Bureau (CAB) as soon as possible.
They may be able to help you avoid more serious action being taken against you and could save you extra costs and charges.
The local CAB is based at Bennet House, Horsemarket, Darlington – Tel: (01325) 380755.
Council Tax Benefit
This can help people on low incomes with their council tax bill. Benefit entitlement is based on income and family circumstances. If you do not have a partner but there is another adult with a low income in your home, you might be able to get some help with your bill – Second Adult Rebate.
More details on council tax benefit, second adult rebate and how to apply