Council Tax bailiffs first visit - where do I go from here **WON**

[crockie]

Nintendo

 

A bit of background again - bailiffs are chasing for 08/09 & 09/10.

 

In September 08 our 08/09 account was passed to bailiffs but then recalled after I made a complaint due to terrible treatment from the Bailiff. We made an agreement with the council and made payments but then fell on hard times again. Within a few months we were back on our feet and I wrote to the council and made an offer of payment which was in effect refused (as we couldnt comply with their response).

 

Since then we have received the following correspondence:

 

A letter from May which was in reply to a letter I sent making an offer of payment. This letter states that they will accept an offer of payment for arrears 08/09 but not for 09/10 and that a summons will be issued for 09/10 unless payment is received by 2/6.

 

Next thing we have is a liability order dated 30.60.

 

Then the bailiffs shoved letters through our door on 9/12.

 

We have never been able to pay our council tax direct to the council, it allways ends up being passed to bailiffs and then we end up paying such large payments to them that we then cant pay the folowing years

Vicious circle.

 

I have now written to a senior recovery officer twice but he says he has to take a "stance" and will not recall or put a hold on the action, despite the fact that we are currently making substantial payments to the council.

 

There is every chance that by then end of next week I will have been able to pay half of the amount owed, which would cover the 08/09 liability order but will still leave the 09/10 order with the Bailiffs.

 

Any ideas on anything extra I can do would be gratefully received.

[Nintendo Pü]

I think you have been screwed over in bailiffs fees making your situation much worse.

 

Write to the council - simple letter - How much council tax liability for 08/09 and explain how much has been paid.

 

Another simple letter - for year 09/10.

 

Collate all your receipts showing how much you paid to the bailiffs for year 08/09 and again for year 09/10.

 

Now send this letter (2 letters, for 08/09 and 09/10) to the bailiffs and have them pass a truth test on their fees. Any irregularity in their fees and these all become recoverable from the council.

 

The Bailiff Company

Their Address 1

Their Address 2

Their Address 3

Postcode

 

BY POST AND BY EMAIL

 

DATE

 

Dear Sir/Madam

 

Re: [YOUR NAME + REF]: Your fees.

 

I write following visits by your bailiff however there appears to an irregularity with your fees and I am writing to ask you to provide me the following within seven (7) days:

 

1) The name of the court that issued the certificate for the bailiff in charge.

 

2) Written itemised breakdown of a) your fees, and b) the original debt.

 

3) The name and address of the organisation that instructed you

 

4) If you have charged non-statutory fees prescribed in law, a breakdown of your costs to show they are reasonable and not charged for the purpose of making a gain for yourself or another.

 

5) a) Truthfully confirm in writing your fees are lawful and comply with legislation or, b) refund me the unlawful fees plus reasonable compensation for being cheated by your bailiff with his fees by midday the seventh day from the date of this letter.

 

A bailiff or any other person who dishonestly charges for work that has not been done will be committing an arrestable offence under the Fraud Act 2006. Section 2 of the Act specifically describes a person dishonestly makes a false representation and intends, by making the representation, to make a gain for himself or another, or cause a loss to another, or expose another to a risk of loss therefore, if no satisfactory refund is made to me by 12.00 midday seven (7) days from the date of this letter I will automatically file a complaint to police under the 2006 Fraud Act and the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002. If you have charged VAT on unlawful fees then you may be reported for VAT fraud and your documents will be given in evidence.

 

Case law requires I recover unlawful bailiffs fees from your client that instructed you. If you fail to make the required refund within seven days I will automatically proceed by filing the claim at court.

 

This is a letter before action and is not a request to access any personal data about me in the meaning of the Data Protection Act 1998. It is delivered by Royal Mail and deem it good service upon you by the ordinary course of post under Section 7 of the Interpretation Act 1978. It now is your responsibility and in your best interests this letter is handed to the relevant person within your organisation.

 

Yours Sincerely

 

YOUR NAME

Copied to: [NAME OF COUNCIL]

[crockie]

Nintendo, thanks for your help

 

Before I saw your repsonse last night I emailed the council via their complaints system and said that I wanted to escalate the complaint as I was unhappy with their response. I have now had a reply saying that it will now be looked at by the head of finance.

 

The bailiff company that are currently chasing us are a different company to the one we had to deal with originally. Thanks to the people on this forum we have had some fees back from the first company but not the full amount that I am pretty sure we were owed.

 

Is there a time limit on chasing unlawful fees?

 

The company that are currently chasing us have allready confirmed in writing that they are charging us £49.00. They have made ONE visit but are charging us £24.50 per liability order.

 

Have been reading through the threads and shouldnt we have had a notice to say that they were applying for a summons for 09/10?

 

Sorry if this is all a little garbled, my baby isnt very well at the moment so I am trying to get on here whilst he is asleep

[crockie]

Just wanted to add, that we hold our hands up completely we havent paid the council tax (we simply couldnt) and desparately want to get the situation resolved. We are currently paying in excess of £100 per week directly to the council.

 

However due to the incident with the previous Bailiff I am not prepared to pay any Bailiff a penny and dont really fancy playing sitting duck for another 2 months untill Bailiff co have to return it to the council.

 

Thanks once again to everyone who is offering help/advice

[Nintendo Pü]

 

Is there a time limit on chasing unlawful fees?

 

 

Six years. Section 2 of the Limitation Act 1980.

 

The company that are currently chasing us have allready confirmed in writing that they are charging us £49.00. They have made ONE visit but are charging us £24.50 per liability order.

 

One visit is charged as one visit. You dont have to pay the fee twice just because theres two LO's.

 

Have been reading through the threads and shouldnt we have had a notice to say that they were applying for a summons for 09/10?

 

Regulation 33(1) of the Council Tax (Administration and Enforcement) Regulations 1992 requires the council to send you a "final Notice" at your current address or your last known address before instructing a bailiff. If the council fails to comply with the law you can ask the council to take the case back into town hall administration and no bailiffs fees are lawfully due. Regulation 34 requires the council to issue of a summons directed to that person to appear before the court.

 

If the council fails to comply with the regulations, you can ask the council to stop enforcement, remove all the fees, and roll the case back to the Final Notice state to give you an opportunity to pay. You can escalate to the LGO and ask for compensation if the council fobs you off with contact the bailiffs.

[crockie]

Six years. Section 2 of the Limitation Act 1980.

 

 

 

One visit is charged as one visit. You dont have to pay the fee twice just because theres two LO's.

 

 

 

Regulation 33(1) of the Council Tax (Administration and Enforcement) Regulations 1992 requires the council to send you a "final Notice" at your current address or your last known address before instructing a bailiff. If the council fails to comply with the law you can ask the council to take the case back into town hall administration and no bailiffs fees are lawfully due. Regulation 34 requires the council to issue of a summons directed to that person to appear before the court.

 

If the council fails to comply with the regulations, you can ask the council to stop enforcement, remove all the fees, and roll the case back to the Final Notice state to give you an opportunity to pay. You can escalate to the LGO and ask for compensation if the council fobs you off with contact the bailiffs.

 

Thank you so much for your help.

 

I am now off to get all old paperwork out and look at those fees again.

 

Then I am going to tip the whole house upside dowm looking fo a summons for this year. 08/09 is a lost cause as I am sure that we had all the paperwork but I cant find a summons for 09/10 and I have kept all the paperwork together.

 

As for the fact that they cant charge for two lots of £24.50, where do I find the legislation or whatever to prove this? I am aware of the court case thing but the bailiffs obviously arent because the letter posted at the begining of the thread is from an associate director.

 

At the end of the day if they cant charge two fees for one visit (which they are already doing) then they are already tryign to defraud me. Ok granted at the moment it is only £24.50 but hey it's another stick to beat them with.

[Nintendo Pü]

 

Then I am going to tip the whole house upside dowm looking fo a summons for this year. 08/09 is a lost cause as I am sure that we had all the paperwork but I cant find a summons for 09/10 and I have kept all the paperwork together..

 

You dont necesarily need the summons, you just need the liability order, write to the court and ask them to say what the amount was, and the date, write to the council for the same concurrently.

 

The legislation setting the visit fee is Amendment 5 of the Council Tax and Non-Domestic Rating (Amendment) (England) Regulations 2006 but originally the legislation setting the visit requirement is Regulation 14(2) (amended) see 'head A' and Regulation 45(2) (for levying distress on your goods) of the Council Tax (Administration and Enforcement) Regulations 1992

 

For multiple visits, the first visit is £24.50 and the second is £18.00. The legislation doesnt provide for bailiffs charging a visit fees twice because there is more than one liability order.

[crockie]

You dont necesarily need the summons, you just need the liability order, write to the court and ask them to say what the amount was, and the date, write to the council for the same concurrently.

 

The legislation setting the visit fee is Amendment 5 of the Council Tax and Non-Domestic Rating (Amendment) (England) Regulations 2006 but originally the legislation setting the visit requirement is Regulation 14(2) (amended) see 'head A' and Regulation 45(2) (for levying distress on your goods) of the Council Tax (Administration and Enforcement) Regulations 1992

 

For multiple visits, the first visit is £24.50 and the second is £18.00. The legislation doesnt provide for bailiffs charging a visit fees twice because there is more than one liability order.

 

Cheers

[tomtubby]

[As for the fact that they cant charge for two lots of £24.50, where do I find the legislation or whatever to prove this?

 

With so many people now having severe financial difficulties, it is sadly commonplace for a debtor to have 2 or more Liability Orders with a bailiff and the majority of bailiffs ( and of course their respective companies) seeing an opportunity to apply "multiple fees".

 

If challenged, the bailiff company will almost always respond to say that each Liability Order is a separate (court) order to which separate fees can be applied. This is not the case.

 

There has been just one visit, and if the bailiff does levy upon goods he cannot levy upon the same goods twice.

 

If there is a dispute regarding bailiff fees, the debtor can apply for Detailed Assessment. This is where a District Judge will consider the statutory fees as laid down by Parliament and case law to establish what charges should have been charged by the bailiff. In the past, the District Judge was referred to as a Costs Judge.

 

Very few, if any...Detailed Assessments get reported as they are County Court proceedings and if it were not for sites like this one, they would remain unknown. .

 

One of the very best Detailed Assessments is Anthony Culligan v Marston Group regarding parking charge notices and immobilisation of vehicles and this can be used as the basis for challenging fees for PCN enforcement.

 

When a bailiff attempts to apply "multiple charges" for enforcing more than one Liability Order then the Detailed Assessment that we always refer to is in the case of Throssell v Leeds City Council where the Judge confirmed that "there is just one visit by one bailiff" etc.

 

There is an additional Detailed Assessment in the case of Mischon v Drakes where again, the Court confirmed that just one visit fee and one levy fee can be applied when enforcing multiple warrants.

 

.

[Nintendo Pü]

in the case of Throssell v Leeds City Council where the Judge confirmed

.

 

 

You have quoted this case to support many of your posts, I have previously asked you for a source to your information, but you ignore my requests.

 

Please provide me with the case number.

 

There has never been a High Court ruling by that name.

[jimbo45]

deleted

Edited January 8, 2010 by jimbo45
link broken

[tomtubby]

You have quoted this case to support many of your posts, I have previously asked you for a source to your information, but you ignore my requests.

 

Please provide me with the case number.

 

There has never been a High Court ruling by that name.

 

If you had read the post correctly, I had said that this is a County Court case and is NOT a High Court case. That could explain why you have been unable to find a ruling.

 

This case is also referred to by John Kruse who is the UK Expert in Bailiff Law in his book: The Law of Seizure of Goods: Debtors Rights and Remedies.

 

This Judgement was provided to our office by CAB and the Applicant is Michael Throssell ( in person) with the Respondent being Leeds City Council. The case was in Leeds County Court under the case number of; 9350977.

 

I have spoken with Mr Throssell and he has confirmed to me that neither he or Leeds City Council appealed this case.

 

Once again, another critical post by you to question my answers and again to infer that no such case exists. In other words that I am lying.

 

This is something that is becoming commmon place by you. Please stop it.

[Nintendo Pü]

If you had read the post correctly, I had said that this is a County Court case and is NOT a High Court case. That could explain why you have been unable to find a ruling.

 

This case is also referred to by John Kruse who is the UK Expert in Bailiff Law in his book: The Law of Seizure of Goods: Debtors Rights and Remedies.

 

Then why do you quote it to as authority? The legislation sets out the visits fees, and this alone can be relied on when drafting the claimants paperwork.

 

This is something that is becoming commmon place by you. Please stop it.

 

I will ask you to do the same place.

[crockie]

Just wanted to give this a quick update.

 

We have now made 8 payments (direct to the council) totalling just over £1000.00 , in two weeks time we will have paid enough to clear one of the liability orders.

 

Since I upgraded our complaint to the council we haven't received any further correspondence from them.

 

I was going to chase them up because in all honesty I would be far happier if I had a letter in my hand saying the Bailiff wont be coming back but at the end of the day we havent seen or heard from the Bailiffs for 8 weeks now

 

I can only assume that the council has put a hold on the action whilst we are making payments. I am not under any illusion however that they wont be back like a shot if we miss a payment but I will do my upmost best to make sure that doesnt happen.

 

So although I have not relaxed 100%, doors/windows are still locked etc, things are a little more chilled.

 

So a BIG THANK YOU to everyone who gave me the courage to say "yes, we owe the money, yes we will pay the money but only to the council and Mr Bailiff can crawl back under his stone.

 

haha you watch, I will have tempted fate now and Mr Nastyknickers will be banging down my door at 7.30am on Monday.

[seanamarts]

they do work on saturdays too

[ploddertom]

Just remember to add any agreed fees ie 1st Visit at the end as this will alraedy have been paid to them by the Council.

 

PT

[crockie]

Just remember to add any agreed fees ie 1st Visit at the end as this will alraedy have been paid to them by the Council.

 

PT

 

oh yes, I shall be paying the council every single penny as per the letters the bailiff stuffed through the door.

 

Then when it is all clear I shall want a full explanation as to why they are charging me per liability order not per visit.

 

As per the Bailiffs letter, the current charges stand at £49.00. Their letter states that they are entitled to charge me £24.50 X2 as there is two liability orders, despite the fact that they admit to only calling at our house once.

 

We all know that they can only charge per visit not per liability order but I am happy to pay the extra £24.50 and then argue about it later. At least that way they have no hold over me

[crockie]

they do work on saturdays too

 

I know but previous Bailiff, who we had a horrendous experience with turned up at 07.30am on a weekday.

 

17 months later and I still literally hate 07.30 Monday-Friday .

[crockie]

WOOOOOHOOOOOOOO :D

 

I can open my windows again

 

Today I have received an email from the council which confirms that they have suspended Bailiff Action. This is on the agreement that I keep to my payments or advise them if I cant keep up with them.

 

AND to make things better they are also saying that if we cant afford to make payments for 2010/2011 at the same time as we are paying the arrears off then please contact them and they should be able to make arrangments for the 10/11 installments to begin later.

 

I am one happy bunny today.

 

My apologies if this sounds like I am gloating as this really isnt my intention, I am just so happy that I can relax in my own home again

 

Anyone who is having the same problems, please, please keep on at the council to suspend any action, it does work sometimes.

 

Thank you once again to everyone who provided support and advice.

[ploddertom]

Wonderful news for you, it certainly pays to persevere.

 

PT

[seanamarts]

fabulous news

[hallowitch]

well done:)

[sea-sidelady]

Title altered for you win.

 

Well done

[hallowitch]

2 wins in 1 day

 

thanks sea-sidelady

[sea-sidelady]

Keep them coming!!