6 months rule on council tax | Discuss

It seems that the council are trying another new tactic to recover unpaid council tax.  We have been caught by this twice now and fighting our corner.

The scenario is this.  The tenant has the usual AST which is continuous after the initial 6 month period. The tenant pays rent and council tax as they should for a period of time, they then inform the council that they are no longer in the property - so they stop paying the council tax.  

However, the tenant continues to pay the rent for a few more months.  The tenant then stops paying the rent but does not hand back keys, simply does not pay any further rent.  The tenant eventually leaves the property without notice, no doubt having secured another property ripe for the same scheme.

The agents involved start to prepare the property to be let again to another tenant and out of the blue the landlord (me) is hit with a huge council tax bill from the date the tenant TOLD the council that they had left the property.  Beating in mind the council are continuing to pay housing benefit during this whole process!

Although we have proof of full rent payments etc and that the rent was paid up to a certain date which was in fact several months after the council are trying to collect unpaid council tax from me,  the council insist that they only take the date the tenant gives them as being the date that they, the tenant, are no longer liable to pay the council tax.

As this is the second time this has happened in one year I am convinced this action was well thought through with absolute knowledge of what actions the council would and therefore wouldn't take.  The council are not interested in proof of rent even though it is clearly illogical that a tenant would still be paying rent if they were no longer living at the property.  By the time the keys eventually got back to the agents some 8 months had elapsed.  The additional problem here is that the council does not inform either the agent or myself that the council tax is not being paid and are obviously so far behind sending out new council tax bills that the council are ready to take action for non-payment of the council tax unless I pay almost £1000 in unpaid council tax dated from April 2018.  My actual responsibility would be from November 2018 to the end of March unless another tenant takes on the property in the meantime.

The simple phrase from the council is that, they take the date the tenant gives them, without proof, that they are no longer living at the property and therefore the landlord is responsible for the unpaid council tax.

This is so obviously the way the council are abusing their position to collect unpaid council tax from the only people they think they are likely to be able to claim from.  Cynically, I can't think of another reason for this appalling behaviour.

Has anyone else encountered this yet and if so, how did you deal with it.