12 July - Teething problems with Council Tax Direct Debit reminders
I don’t often look at Facebook but I suspect that is where I saw people
complaining that Bexley Council had sent out Council Tax payment reminders at the end of June and
scared a good few people. I haven’t seen how it was worded and maybe it was not
as clear as it should have been but surely payment reminders are almost the norm in business these days?
I get a countdown from my domain name registrar over about six weeks but my
mobile service, a car ‘club’ which supposedly provides cheaper insurance
- but doesn’t - Octopus Energy and my Council garden waste service and probably others all send text reminders
with a few days notice.
My credit card provider recently extended their pre-warning email with a
follow up text message to confirm that they have successfully taken the money
which seems a little OTT but I don’t see it as a problem.
Maybe not sending reminders is more of a problem. Surrey Cricket Club failed
to send me a warning or to take my Membership fee in January while other Members of the
cricket gang were warned and debited; one of them twice!. I emailed an enquiry and was told that I was
not Direct Debited because I had paid in full on October 24th. I definitely hadn’t and told them so. There was no reply
and I assumed that when they eventually checked the records properly they would get in touch.
They did not but last month I was hauled out of the queue for the Oval and told that my Direct Debit had been declined
six months earlier and my Membership cancelled with immediate effect.
Since then my bank has confirmed that SCC made no debit application and their
Commercial Director has told me that they have all sorts of problems with their
Direct Debiting system. You would think that they might belatedly ask for the money and
restore my Membership with some compensation for the lost matches; but no. 2023
membership is no longer on offer so I am out.
I doubt I will be going to the Oval again. But back to Bexley Council’s Council
Tax reminders. Believe it or not the procedural change was considered to be
sufficiently important to merit a short debate by the Finance Committee.
Councillor June Slaughter (Sidcup) was the first to raise the issue.
She said a “constant stream of texts and emails was extremely irritating” and
maybe she is be right but it is not difficult to ignore them. She must have had
similar thoughts and ruminated about people simply ignoring the
messages and whether a warning would make any difference to people who have insufficient funds.
More directly she asked what the experience of other Councils that had adopted
similar systems was. “Does it cost money? Can residents opt out?”
The Council Officer said it was a new initiative to try to
reduce the DD failure rate currently standing at 3%. It would be kept under review and take account of residents’ comments.
There is no cost to Bexley Council but there is no opt out facility currently.
Labour Leader Stefano Borella said he received two such warnings which caused
him to panic momentarily. “Old people mighty think it is a scam.” (Isn’t that ageist Stef?)
He was told that the text message had been sent to people due to pay on the first of the
month for whom a mobile number was on their Council Tax records. The duplication
was caused by the initial messaging being flagged as failed and then someone or
something pressed the Rerun button twice! It won’t happen again and the message
text will be simplified for 15th July and next month.
Councillor Francis (Labour, Belvedere) was concerned by the lack of a text opt out
facility and asked what the procedure was for unsubscribing. If it cannot be
done quickly would there be a breach of GDPR? Deputy Council Leader said it was being looked into.
One Councillor planned to opt out. You’d think there might be better ways of expending one’s energy.