Council Tax Bailiff Visit fees to old address!

[SabSab]

Hello everyone,

I have spent the last few days looking through these forums and have found them extremely useful. I know realise that I cannot be charged for an Attendance/Van fee before I have even signed a Walking Possession Agreement amongst other useful facts I've been directed to through these forums.

However there was one question I have that I have been unable to find an answer for. I owe some Council Tax from a previous address and was not aware of this until several weeks ago when some mail was forwarded to me, not from the address I owe Council Tax to but another old address - I have not lived there for many years. I contacted the Debt Recovery agency and Bailiff and requested a breakdown of charges. This was sent to me at my current address and the following charges were listed;

Sept 25 2007 - Council Tax Debt: £582.95
Sept 25 2007 - Visit Fee 1: £24.50
Oct 22 2007 - Visit Fee 2: £18.00
Oct 24 2007 - Attendance/Van: £179.50

By telephone I asked them why I should be liable for the visit charges when I did not live at this address, to which they replied it was the address the council had given them and I had to pay all charges. However when I mentioned I had not signed WPA so they could not charge me a Van fee the rep stumbled and told me to minus that from the total charge.

Can they insist I pay the visit charges, if it was not to my current address?

I am going to pay the arrears in full to the council on payday and am writing to both the council and agency/bailiff to inform them. I will first request the council to confirm the amount in arrears is correct as I have noticed some stories of Bailiffs over charging that way also.

I hope I'm doing the right thing. Any advice would be appreciated.

Thanks, SabSab.

[tomtubby]

I would normally say pay the bailiff co but in this case I would advise paying the local authority as these fees are wrong. They can charge an attending to remove fee where there are returning to collect the goods listed on a Walking Possession.

You need to WRITE to the company for a full and detailed breakdown of the fees and charges and the name of the actual bailiff that attended.

Can you pm me with the name of the bailiff and the company that he works for.