valuation tribunal, discretionary council tax award , help please

I have an appeal hearing coming up soon at a valuation tribunal for discretionary council tax award ,any case law or tips on these tribunals operate and tactics most welcome

Diogenes - 24 March 2022 02:15 PM

I have an appeal hearing coming up soon at a valuation tribunal for discretionary council tax award ,any case law or tips on these tribunals operate and tactics most welcome

This may be a good place to start https://www.valuationtribunal.gov.uk/

I’ll send you some training stuff via the message thingy re etc etc

Many thanks , I see I have a message , never used the message thingy before, on this site !!!!!

Update on this Discretionary Council reduction tax case >>>>>case was heard by The Valuation tribunal on 01 09 22 and decision received on 03 10 22, appeal allowed, the local authority have been ordered to reduce the 2 years council tax prior to the application to nil, the result is that as my client had paid via deductions from her wages she has £2500 refund due from the LA and no council tax to pay until April 2023

Diogenes - 12 October 2022 02:41 PM

Update on this Discretionary Council reduction tax case >>>>>case was heard by The Valuation tribunal on 01 09 22 and decision received on 03 10 22, appeal allowed, the local authority have been ordered to reduce the 2 years council tax prior to the application to nil, the result is that as my client had paid via deductions from her wages she has £2500 refund due from the LA and no council tax to pay until April 2023

Hooray!!!!!!!

see my very interesting HB appeal outcome against the same LA from last week

Diogenes - 12 October 2022 02:41 PM

Update on this Discretionary Council reduction tax case >>>>>case was heard by The Valuation tribunal on 01 09 22 and decision received on 03 10 22, appeal allowed, the local authority have been ordered to reduce the 2 years council tax prior to the application to nil, the result is that as my client had paid via deductions from her wages she has £2500 refund due from the LA and no council tax to pay until April 2023

Hi Diogenes, just wondering if you could give a few more details about the appeal, assume it was a Section 13A (1c) of the Local Government Finance Act 1992 and not LCTRS as well?

Thanks.

chacha
yes 13A , standard case, client has negative income , trouble was my LA had never given a 13A award and had no intention of ever doing so, they tried to suggest my client was spending money on non priority items and even suggested she should go bankrupt or get a DRO, I pointed out that the LA are not qualified or licensed debt advisors, and used the case law, [Yorkshire cases] to show the LA were being unreasonable and had fettered their discretion, it did not help the LA that the letters they send to applicants of 13A , invariably an refusing an award tell the applicant that there is no right of appeal.
The Valuation Tribunal did not fall for the LA argument and a good award was made.
alan murdie has done a great training pack on this issue, I will try and add a link to it on here

Thanks very much for that. Confirms a niggling thought I have had with discretionary funding and discretionary reductions when it comes to how LAs are notifying decisions on applications/requests.