Local council in Staffordshire writes off debts

Business rate debts worth more than £90,000 have been written off by Stafford Borough Council after being deemed “irrecoverable”.

Cabinet members also wrote off a council tax debt of £10,512.84 at their December meeting.

Councillor Ralph Cooke, cabinet member for resources, said the irrecoverable council tax amount represented 0.01% of outstanding collectable debt in the current year. He added: “There are five irrecoverable business rate debts of £90,458.

“I would add that the cost of collecting the debt is considered as part of the decision to put debts forward for write-off. If we get further information concerning the whereabouts of any individual debtors, the council will rigorously and vigorously pursue recovery action.”

Cabinet members also received a report on the level of council tax and business rates collected during the first half of the financial year, as well as how much overpaid housing benefit had been covered during the same period. The report said: “Efficient collection of the council’s revenues is of major importance to the funding of council services and those provided by our preceptors.

“Council tax due for the 2024/2025 year amounts to £105.3m, of which some 56% was collected by the end of September. This is the same as last year’s performance in the same period, though is slightly lower than pre-pandemic levels (56.7% in the same period of 2019/20).

“This would seem to indicate that we are making progress with our recovery processes but have a little way to go before reaching pre-Covid levels. Business rates due for the current year amounts to £55.9m, of which some 59.1% was collected by the end of September, showing a decrease on the previous year (60.4%).

“There is no obvious single reason for this marginal reduction as recovery action has been taken against defaulters in the usual way. Officer will work hard to try to reverse the dip, in the second half of the year.

“The council manages the Housing Benefit scheme on behalf of the Department for Work and Pensions, who fund the cost of benefits paid to claimants. Sometimes a claimant will be paid too much Housing Benefit, for example when the council does not become aware of a change of circumstances until after the claimant has been paid the benefit.

“The council is expected to recover these overpayments from the claimant in all but a few limited circumstances. Recovery of overpaid Housing Benefit continues to progress well, with some £231K being collected in the first half of the financial year.”