Business Rates Payment Problems

Payment

You must pay your business rates bill on or before the due date shown on your bill. If you do not, then we could take recovery action against you.

If you have difficulty paying your bill, please contact a business rates officer on 01227 862316 or email businessrates@ashford.gov.uk without delay.

Enforcement action

If our bills aren’t paid then a liability order can be issued by the Magistrates Court. This order will allow us to take further action and employ a company to secure payment from you.

You may have heard of these companies referred to as bailiffs. However, since government changes on 6 April 2014 they are now known as Enforcement Agents.

The new regulations include:

The introduction of a seven-day notice of enforcement, designed to encourage early payment or an additional opportunity for those who owe the council money to seek advice;
Changes to the days and hours when enforcement action can take place;
Changes to how an enforcement agent may access a property;
Making it compulsory for the enforcement agents to give certain information when a ‘controlled goods agreement’ is made;
How the sale of any goods seized will be handled;
A new set of fees that enforcement agents must use.

These regulations can be read online:

The three stages of business rates enforcement action

Stage 1 – A fee of £75 for each instruction that is passed by the council to an Enforcement Agent
Stage 2 – A fee of £235 covers all work carried out but a further charge of 7.5% of any debt value over £1,500 will also be applied
Stage 3 – A fee of £110 plus 7.5% of any debt value over £1,500

Our agents

Below is a list of agents that are authorised to act on behalf of Ashford Borough Council. Always quote your account number when making contact with an Enforcement Agent.

Once we have instructed, the Enforcement Agent takes full responsibility for collecting the debt and it is our decision not to interfere with their operations.