Ensuring customers are not subject to unnecessary recovery action, additional costs or hardship

The request was successful.

Dear Epsom and Ewell Borough Council,

A council taxpayer who owes more than just the current year's liability runs the risk of incurring additional recovery costs through a further application for a liability order if payments which are intended for the current year's liability are allocated by the council's computer to the previous year's liability. This would most likely happen where a non specific payment is made and the computer software is set to automatically allocate these payments to the oldest year's debt.

Councils computer systems have the necessary flexibility to be set to allow non specific payments to be allocated to the arrears or the current year's liability.

I understand that the majority of billing authorities have their computer software set to ensure that their customers are not subject to unnecessary recovery action, additional costs or hardship, i.e. so non specific payments are allocated to the current year's liability.

How does Epsom and Ewell Council have its computer software set to deal with non specific payments. Current or oldest year's liability?

Yours faithfully,

Gwyn Worth

foi, Epsom and Ewell Borough Council

Dear Gwyn Worth

Thank you for contacting Epsom & Ewell Borough Council; please note the
above reference number for your request.    I have passed this to the
relevant department and will respond as soon as I have their reply.
 Please allow up to 20 working days for a response under the Freedom of
Information Act.

Yours sincerely

 

Elaine Murphy

Legal Secretary

Epsom & Ewell Borough Council

Tel    01372 732144

Fax   01372732111

P Please do not print this e-mail unless absolutely necessary - SAVE
PAPER

 

foi, Epsom and Ewell Borough Council

Dear Gwyn Worth

 

I write in reply to your recent Freedom of Information request; please
find Epsom & Ewell Borough Council’s response below:

 

·         How does Epsom and Ewell Council have its computer software set
to deal with non-specific payments. Current or oldest year's liability?

Currently at Epsom & Ewell Borough Council, our revenues system is
configured to allocate payments that do not match an arrangement or
instalment profile, to the oldest debt.  However if a

taxpayer informs us within a reasonable timeframe, that they wish for
their monies to be allocated to an alternative debt we will re-allocate
the monies and remove any recovery action which may

have occurred.  In addition if a payment is allocated to a debt which is
in recovery, a daily list of payments is checked to ensure any monies
allocated to these arrears are done so correctly and if

that is not the case, they will be manually re-allocated by an officer.

 

Most of the information the Council provides in response to requests will
be subject to copyright protection. This includes attachments. In most
cases the copyright will be owned by Epsom & Ewell Borough Council.
However, the copyright in some information may be owned by a third party. 
You are free to use any information supplied in this response for your own
non-commercial research or private study purposes.  The information may
also be used for any other purpose allowed by a limitation or exception in
copyright law, such as news reporting. 

 

Except as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, the
information supplied may not be copied, distributed, published, or
exploited for commercial purposes, financial gain or direct marketing.

 

If you want to re-use the information provided and the Council is the
copyright owner you must make an application to the Council under the
Re-use of Public Sector Information Regulations 2015. Where the copyright
is owned by a third party, you must obtain the third party’s consent in
order to re-use the information.

 

Yours sincerely

 

Elaine Murphy

Legal Secretary

Epsom & Ewell Borough Council

Tel    01372 732144

Fax   01372732111

P Please do not print this e-mail unless absolutely necessary - SAVE
PAPER

 

show quoted sections

Dear foi,

Thank you for your response. I consider Epsom & Ewell Borough Council has provided the information I requested. The purpose of this exercise was to ascertain whether or not the principles surrounding the appropriation of payments were being adhered to.

R v Miskin Lower Justices (1953)

It was held in R v Miskin Lower Justices, that where an amount obviously relates to a specific liability, it would be an unwarranted assumption to allocate the payment elsewhere.

If no instruction is given at the time of payment, then the council has a duty to allocate payment to the account which it is most beneficial to the debtor to reduce. That would be in the majority of cases the current liability if the consequences of allocating payment to the arrears meant that the customer was subject to unnecessary recovery action, additional costs etc.

I understand by the council's response (see *note*) that there are measures in place to ensure that unspecified payments are allocated to the account which it is least burdensome for the debtor, and consequently the laws surrounding the appropriation of payments are being complied with. This effectively means that an unmatched payment allocated to the oldest debt (having the consequences of putting the current year's liability also in arrears) would be reallocated to the current year's liability on account of the circumstances implying that this was the debtor's intention (least burdensome for the debtor). If it appears I have misunderstood anything from what I have stated I would appreciate if you would correct me.

*Note*: "...our revenues system is configured to allocate payments that do not match an arrangement or instalment profile, to the oldest debt. However if a taxpayer informs us within a reasonable timeframe, that they wish for their monies to be allocated to an alternative debt we will re-allocate the monies and remove any recovery action which may have occurred. In addition if a payment is allocated to a debt which is in recovery, a daily list of payments is checked to ensure any monies allocated to these arrears are done so correctly and if that is not the case, they will be manually re-allocated by an officer."

Yours sincerely,

Gwyn Worth