Just got my new Council Tax bill (oh what joy),enclosed with it was a form to donate my organs should I die.
Was this incase I keeled over at the sight of it?,or was it an alternative method of payment.

Now theres an idea...cant afford your Council Tax?,donate your liver...couldnt be more simple.

Yeah got mine this week too, it amazes me how it can go up every year at way over inflation.
5.3% increase this year...... and at least that for over the last few years.

The day the council tax or water rates go down I'll buy the first round in the pub, believe me that never happens.

Depressing isn't it. 5.3% is a hell of a lot.

Of course, when you pay by direct debit and the monthly payments go up by a fiver, it doesn't sound a lot.

People who own empty properties have been stung this year... Up till last year if you owned an empty property you would have qualified for a 50% reduction in council tax. However this year empty properties are only entitled to 25% reduction... nice sneaky tactic.

5.3%more bins emptied then?Or are our glorious council going to pull out all the stops this year and spend it on the paying public or waste it on another greenhouse for the peace gardens?

Yep, got mine. £397 per month. Business rates. Niiiiice!

hold on, you all want improved services, but you expect the council to deliver without raising rates...

Regarding comments on the increase in payments for empty houses, perhaps there needs to be a way of disencouraging people from owning multiple properties, with the supposed shortage.

With all the talk of the massive house building programmes over the country, the money made by unscrupulous landlords, will the country have green spaces in 100 years' time?

Maybe it's one way of changing the trends.

Originally posted by Cyclone
hold on, you all want improved services, but you expect the council to deliver without raising rates...
Yes but the point is the rates are rising above current inflation and have done for the past ?? years??...whereas salaries are increasing if lucky at inflation and probably less...work out the sums.
Quality of service hasn't increased greatly either IMO

Isn't the government supposed to clamping down on local authorities who take the michael with over inflated council tax charges? If they are, then surely Sheffield City Council is probably high on their list of corrupt local authorities! It wouldn't be so bad if we actually got value for money, but public services are poor and the road network is falling to pieces all beacause some fat cat in planning wants a cut of the cash to build some stupid non essential multistorey carpark or whatever!!!!!!!

the clampdown was on councils raising rates by double figures, sometimes high double figures. 5.x has to be one of the lowest in the country.

Of course it's higher than inflation. If you want improved facilities and not just to maintain the status quo then it costs more than inflation.

Sheffield got away with it despite the rise being above inflation because as a previous post states it is one of the lowest rises in the country...by the way who do I contact about getting the buggers to fill in potholes on my road??

In NE Derbyshire we have increases of;

District Council up 2.98%
Parish Council up 6.79%
Police tax up 9.94%

I somehow don't think we'll be getting a pro-rata improvement in services.

It's about time the banding of properties was looked at, just take Band A for properties of 40K or less. That is a joke. How many people can buy a house for that amount of money?

Can anybody tell me how tenants in rented accomodation have their tax calculated when the property does not belong to them?

Originally posted by Mo
It's about time the banding of properties was looked at, just take Band A for properties of 40K or less. That is a joke. How many people can buy a house for that amount of money?
Mo, there's no point in re-evaluating the banding to take into account the increases in property prices since 1991. Banding properties is just a crude way of judging how well off people are. The theory I suppose is the bigger the more valuable the house the better off you must be.

If you live in one of the cheapest properties around you're property goes into prop band A and you pay the least amount of council tax. If you live in one of the most expensive properties you are put in band H and pay the most.

If you re-evaluate the prop band table, which is based on 1991 prices, it is unlikely that many properties would change bands. The cheaper houses that used to be under £40k will now be under £100k but will still be in Band A. You'll still pay the same.

Originally posted by Mo
Can anybody tell me how tenants in rented accommodation have their tax calculated when the property does not belong to them? [/B]
The property value determines the banding and therefore the council tax charge. It doesn't matter who owns it. Liability for paying the charge is a separate issue. Tenants are usually liable unless the house is in "multiple occupancy".

IMO the council tax should be scrapped as there are two things wrong with it. It is difficult and expensive to collect (all councils bump up the charge to allow for the people who won't pay) and the value of a property is a poor test of someone’s ability to pay.

The income raised through council tax only makes up a small part of councils' overall annual budgets. Most of the money comes from central government. therefore why not make it all come from central government and increase income tax to pay for it? It would be far cheaper to administer and is a fairer way of determining people’s ability to pay - certainly fairer than crude property valuations.

Originally posted by Zamo
Mo, there's no point in re-evaluating the banding to take into account the increases in property prices since 1991. Banding properties is just a crude way of judging how well off people are. The theory I suppose is the bigger the more valuable the house the better off you must be.

If you live in one of the cheapest properties around you're property goes into prop band A and you pay the least amount of council tax. If you live in one of the most expensive properties you are put in band H and pay the most.

If you re-evaluate the prop band table, which is based on 1991 prices, it is unlikely that many properties would change bands. The cheaper houses that used to be under £40k will now be under £100k but will still be in Band A. You'll still pay the same.




But Zamo it does matter. If you sell your house then the property woud go into another band depending on the sale value. eg if you lived in a Band A property that cost you £39k and sold it for £70k then the property would go into Band C. So the new owner will pay much more Council Tax than say a next door neighbour who also bought an indentical house for £39k and continued to live in it. It's a crazy situation.

Also Band G starts at £160,001 which will take a lot of properties in under todays house price climate. There is only one band higher at Band H. How silly is that? So somebody living in a 4 bed detached in a decent area pays not much different than the Duke of Devonshire !!!!

Originally posted by Zamo
Mo, there's no point in re-evaluating the banding to take into account the increases in property prices since 1991. Banding properties is just a crude way of judging how well off people are. The theory I suppose is the bigger the more valuable the house the better off you must be.

If you live in one of the cheapest properties around you're property goes into prop band A and you pay the least amount of council tax. If you live in one of the most expensive properties you are put in band H and pay the most.

If you re-evaluate the prop band table, which is based on 1991 prices, it is unlikely that many properties would change bands. The cheaper houses that used to be under £40k will now be under £100k but will still be in Band A. You'll still pay the same.



But by your theory, any house that is 50 or 60k would get cheaper council tax. I.E The houses that were under 40k in 1991 will be now that price. So why shouldn't the bands be rethought? As how many houses in Sheffield are under 40k at the moment, not many!!

Originally posted by Mo
But Zamo it does matter. If you sell your house then the property woud go into another band depending on the sale value. eg if you lived in a Band A property that cost you £39k and sold it for £70k then the property would go into Band C. So the new owner will pay much more Council Tax than say a next door neighbour who also bought an indentical house for £39k and continued to live in it. It's a crazy situation.

Also Band G starts at £160,001 which will take a lot of properties in under todays house price climate. There is only one band higher at Band H. How silly is that? So somebody living in a 4 bed detached in a decent area pays not much different than the Duke of Devonshire !!!!

It doesn't work like that. They don't look at individual houses and assess them for council tax. All houses of a similar style and in the same area are all assessed as being in the same band. eg all terraced houses in Crookes have been judged to be in one band while those in neighbouring Walkley may well be a band lower.

If there is a revaluation then the bands will all move together but the tax they attract will remain the same or be altered all together.

I noticed on the leaflet that came with the council tax one little item that wasn't explained anywhere and I wonder if anyone can throw any light on it. The firefighters pension scheme contribution for the year went up from 9.0 million to 11.1 million round about 25% rise .It seems quite a large rise to be made in one year! If pension costs have risen that much in the year why only on firefighters and not on police and other civil servants ?

Originally posted by max
It doesn't work like that. They don't look at individual houses and assess them for council tax. All houses of a similar style and in the same area are all assessed as being in the same band. eg all terraced houses in Crookes have been judged to be in one band while those in neighbouring Walkley may well be a band lower.

If there is a revaluation then the bands will all move together but the tax they attract will remain the same or be altered all together.

I know that houses are valued en bloc, thats why I gave the example that I did of two houses next door to one another valued at the same price.

But when a house is sold the new owner pays a Council tax based on the price they have paid and not the price that the property was originally valued at.

Originally posted by Mo
But when a house is sold the new owner pays a Council tax based on the price they have paid and not the price that the property was originally valued at.

No it's not like that at all. It stays in the same band unless major alterations are done at which point it gets reassessed. Then it might, possibly, move into a different band.

Originally posted by qazitory
But by your theory, any house that is 50 or 60k would get cheaper council tax. I.E The houses that were under 40k in 1991 will be now that price. So why shouldn't the bands be rethought? As how many houses in Sheffield are under 40k at the moment, not many!!
60% of houses in Sheffield are in property band A (under £40k as valued in 1991) because, as Max said, they do not re-evaluate the banding when/if the liability for paying the charge changes.

Yes, all house prices have gone up but the fact remains that poor people still living in the cheapest houses and the richer people in the most expensive houses. Whether you band properties using their value as of 1991 or as it is now in 2004, it doesn't matter. The cheapest houses will still have to be placed in Band A, the most expensive houses in Band H and the rest staggered in between. To re-do the banding table to reflect current prices would therefore be a pointless exercise.

I hope I've explained it better this time!

House banding will be redone in 2005 and they will adjust the pricing brackets but it will be as zamo states the cheepiest house prices will be in band A except that they will not start at 40k it will be at 80k as that is consided cheep for a hose these days but it will not effect the amount of tax paid it will only make it eaiser when looking for a property you will be able to pick a house and automatically say it is in band? as house bands will have been brought inline with current house prices

Originally posted by poster
House banding will be redone in 2005 and they will adjust the pricing brackets but it will be as zamo states the cheepiest house prices will be in band A except that they will not start at 40k it will be at 80k as that is consided cheep for a hose these days but it will not effect the amount of tax paid it will only make it eaiser when looking for a property you will be able to pick a house and automatically say it is in band? as house bands will have been brought inline with current house prices
I didn't realise there was a re-evaluation planned!

I have just looked it up. The banding review in 2005 will only effect Wales. A review for England won't happen until 2007.

As I've said previously, the whole exercise is really a complete waste of time, money and effort. I can hardly believe they have decided to do it. I suppose I should never under-estimate the ability of bureaucrats to p*ss money up the wall!

Anyway, a valuation review will probably never happen. The government has already ordered a review of council tax and I suspect they will announce a replacement before the next election in order to take the wind out of the Lib Dem's sails.

Originally posted by max
No it's not like that at all. It stays in the same band unless major alterations are done at which point it gets reassessed. Then it might, possibly, move into a different band.

I will bow to your superior knowledge on this then Max.

:D

It may well be in 2007 as I can not qiute remember the year that I was given but it will certainly be going ahead this is what I was informed when I spoke to the department in Sheffield who deals with the Housing bands!
But zamo you do seem to be quite involved in this so you may well be correct who knows?

Originally posted by poster
It may well be in 2007 as I can not qiute remember the year that I was given but it will certainly be going ahead this is what I was informed when I spoke to the department in Sheffield who deals with the Housing bands!
But zamo you do seem to be quite involved in this so you may well be correct who knows?
Like I said, I hadn't heard about the re-evaluation until I read your post. The dates are right though as I looked it up on the Valuation Office website. I couldn't beleive they were actually doing it!

I agree Zamo they do seem to wasting money as this really will not benefit anybody, In my honnest opinion I believe that they should charge a flat rate to all houses as people in band H do not get any benefits to Those in band A just around a £1000 more to pay a year just because you have a large house does not mean you have money to throw around make it a flat rateb for all (the same service should be the same price for all)