If you don't pay your Council Tax

If you’re having problems paying your bill, please get in touch to see if we can help you – don’t wait for a reminder notice or court summons.

The easiest way to do this is by completing the online personal financial statement. This process allows you to make an offer of how much you can afford to pay towards your Council Tax arrears.

If you’ve received a reminder notice

If you don’t pay your Council Tax on time, or don’t pay at all, we’ll send you a reminder notice which will tell you to make a payment within seven days and make future payments on time. This will usually be a letter, or we may send a text message if we have your mobile number.

If you’re unable to bring your account up to date, please let us know so we can agree a suitable payment arrangement.  You can do this by completing the online personal financial statement.

If you’ve received a court summons

You’ll receive a court summons if you fail to pay your Council Tax after a reminder notice or you haven’t been in touch to agree a revised payment plan.

The summons will tell you the date and time of the hearing at Liverpool Magistrates’ Court and the amount we are seeking to recover.

When we issue a summons, a cost of £61 is added to your account. You must pay the amount shown on your summons, including the court costs before the hearing date.

If we receive your payment after the hearing date, you’ll need to pay additional court costs of £24.

We can still help you at this stage if you complete the online personal financial statement so we can try to work out a realistic payment schedule with you.

Liability order

If you don’t pay the summons amount and costs before the court hearing date we will ask the magistrates to grant us a liability order, which allows us more powers to recover Council Tax.

A liability order allows us to deduct money from certain benefits or your wages, or to ask an enforcement agency (bailiff) to collect the money from you.

We could also obtain a charging order, take bankruptcy proceedings or committal proceedings. Find out more about ways we can recover Council Tax.