Council Tax Liability when on a de-cant.

I have a tenant who was de-canted from his Social Housing tenancy due to urgent disrepair in May 2023. At the time he had a live CTR claim for his tenancy address; as he understood it his main home was this tenancy so he did not inform the Local Authority.  This CTR claim has subsequently ended for his tenancy address as the Local Authority say he no longer lives there and he now has a council tax bill for his de-cant tenancy from May 2023 - this is too far to get a CTR back-date now. What are his rights? Any ideas? To make matters more complex he has now been offered the De-cant house as a permanent tenancy!

Hello
Would it be worth you checking your local authority’s CTR policy for temporary absence rules? and whether they incorporate rules from HB such as temporary absence with intention to return etc.? So he could argue that he continues to live at the old address and thus is eligible for CTR until he makes a final decision about ending his tenancy.

Our local CTR scheme does allow a max. backdate for new working age claims for 6 months (with good cause)- I don’t know what your scheme will have. A protective new claim with backdate should be made in case a revision request is not successful.

If he has a liability for council tax at two addresses at the same time, perhaps you’re looking at asking for a discretionary write-off on whichever of the addresses he doesn’t get CTR on.
In cases of overlapping council tax liability, for example when someone leaves their tenancy due to DV or repairs and there is a period of unavoidable notice on the old tenancy, I often ask for a discretionary write-off of the council tax bill at the old address.
Great article about asking for a write-off here: https://medium.com/adviser/discretionary-council-tax-reduction-how-to-guide-38e68c298a4e

Thanks for this. I am going to try CTR “Temporary Absence with the intention to return” as well as discretion NOT to recover.