Council Tax Indicator, why? Work completed with and without Completion Certificates.

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Hi, apologies for adding this to the General Dicusssions Forum.

We are in NW England, please can you help.

We decided to sell our pre-war property, so we visited Gov.uk and noticed a Council Tax Indicator “YES” on the property and want to discover why. Does anybody have any answers, thankyou.

We don't want any holdups with a sale and are wondering what the best way forward might be. Can anybody help in this area?

Over the years we have had work completed with and without Local Council Completion Certificates but always to regulated standards. What might all the implications be for that? What might be the best way forward for the sale?


History:
In 1996 we demolished a lean-to /workshop. Later, in 2000, we replaced that area with the kitchen extension, though it is about 1m x 1m larger surface area due to a porch entrance (“ Full Plans Application” was submitted to the local Council and after building control inspections we gained a completion certificate).

Later still, we submitted a “Full Plans Application” for a Dormer En-suite, however, due to unforeseen circumstances and a lack of funds no work commenced so we did not inform the Building Control Inspector of a start date as instructed on the Plan, and the Plan expired (no work started within the 3-year start date time frame).

Many years later, we upgraded the dusty loft area to a lite storage room, not too much weight up there. We added: a raised subfloor topped with T&G boards with insulation beneath, a reroof with insulation beneath and Velux style windows, extra wall sockets, plasterboarded, and entry is still by a loft hatch with a pulldown ladder and smoke detector. We have no receipts or completion certificates though all work was completed to building regulation standards. We understand we will need the Electrical Installations Condition Report and sellers'/buyers' Indemnity Insurance to cover/guarantee the reroof and subfloor. We didn't realise that completion certificates were needed.

Is there a way of finding out about the Indicator YES without contacting the local council? Recently just before I was about to contact the council I became aware that if any work was completed at any time and we did not have building control inspections it’s best not to contact the local authority as we would not be able to apply for Regularisation or Indemnity Insurance and will need to comply to their recommendations and remove part or all of the completed work.

Thankyou for your time.
 
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Phone and ask council planning or whichever body you need to and ask for more details
 
From the www.

If the improvement indicator is 'yes', it means that the council VOA are aware that the current owners have carried out some fairly major improvements to the property (e.g. added an extension, converted the garage into living accomodation etc). For council tax banding purposes these improvements are ignored until the property is next sold, at which point the council tax band will be reassessed and may be raised as a result of the improvements made.

Improvements do not always affect council tax, my own property was extended and a second annex built in the garden, the council inspected the property after we purchased it in 2022 but council tax band has not increased and shows as “No” for improvement on the government web site .
 
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Our property had this ticked when we moved in, I didn't even realise it was a thing beforehand so didn't check. But a few months after we moved in the council tax went up a band, upon appealing it was merely rejected. So I guess it's the luck of the draw if you get fingered or perhaps its because the owners had lived here for 50 odd years and the extensions were done in the 80's.
 
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