Received a council tax bill yet?

[mosy]

I haven't. So,... the Council Tax telephone number just plays music, ditto the main board number, so I gave up each after 15 mins of music.

I tried for two hours to navigate the website, finally managing to be logged in and arrive at the "Get answers fast page". It did me no good at all, since all I could get was "We are checking your details, please be patient", which I gave up after 10 mins waiting, then tried again and gave up after 20 mins of the same hung screen, i.e. being patient and getting nowhere.

I even tried to make a guess payment but it declined my usual card for no reason of mine.

Summary: My experience is that clearly they wish to deter telephoning. Maybe the online journey is one where you have to pick up magic key items along the way, but if you do, clearly I failed to spot them. Is it possible the council's site only works with certain browsers? Or maybe it's only accessible in quieter midnight hours?

Ironically, my first instinct was just to wait until they chased me so I'd find out what I was due to pay. I'm now back in that position. Yer gotta larff.

[buzzbee]

mosy, I've had mine. Not only that I called (quite early in the day I suppose) and spoke to a real human person. Asked them to recalculate my bill over 12 months instead of 10. Second bill arrived and first payment made.

I hate being on hold but somehow this was a smooth process...this time.

[mosy]

Many thanks buzzbee. I must have caught them on a bad day - perhaps post-holiday catchup. It looks as if bills have indeed been issued so mine ought to be available. I'll persevere...

[syd-gal]

Had mine 3 or 4 weeks ago with the 4.2% increase. I know other people who were changed from 12 to 10 payments and they phoned up and soon got it reverted to 12 .