A bailiff gets control
Peter and Janet Stucker used to live in a terraced house with their two young children.
In August 2007, while working as a roofer he slipped and fell off a roof.
He survived but was off work for nine weeks, and by the time he was fit again there wasn't much work about.
Peter had always worked and never claimed benefit, but with no accident insurance he struggled to pay the bills and fell behind with his mortgage.
Eventually he got work but by then he had missed some of his Council Tax instalments.
He managed to pay all but £231.60 of the last years Council Tax by the 1st of April, and was still two months mortgage payments behind when the Council Tax bill for the new financial year arrived.
He had the summons in May, but didn't receive a pre-enforcement notice.
At the beginning of June work had picked up again; so Peter rang the council to ask if they would accept monthly payments for the outstanding £231.60.
He couldn’t afford to pay it all at once, but reckoned he could pay the arrears off by Christmas.
The girl at the council said the debt was now £321.60, there was nothing she could do and Peter must speak to the bailiffs.
He couldn’t understand it, it wasn’t that much money, he could easily pay it off by adding to his monthly instalments, and anyway, his current years Council Tax was being paid by direct debit.
He made an appointment with the CAB to see if they could help.
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