In order to help the council deliver a range of services, we rely on income from a variety of sources to fund this. This means that the Council has a duty to all of its citizens to collect sums that are not paid and to ensure that appropriate collection methods are in place in order to assist with this collection. All billing, collection and recovery activity undertaken is conducted under the Council's debt policy. This is a brief guide to the debt policy and its aims - should you wish to view the entire policy, please see our debt policy document [189kb].
The main aims of the corporate Debt Policy are to:
The Council will undertake several actions in order to achieve the aims of the debt management policy. These include ensuring that:
The Council bills and collects a range of charges such as:
In all cases, where invoices are issued, billing and collection activity will take place in a prompt and efficient manner in order to maximise recovery opportunities. Where an invoice has not been paid and an alternate payment arrangement has not been made, all available recovery options afforded by the legislation will be considered although assessment of individual circumstances will be made prior to action being taken. The recovery options which may be taken include but are not limited to:
Where there is Council Tax debt and the individual is in receipt of maximum Council Tax Reduction, we may consider making deductions through Water Direct. This allows the council to make direct deductions from state benefits in order to pay Water and Waste Water charges.
For debts due for Non-Domestic Rates, the Council reserves the right to publicise the details of businesses operating in Glasgow that fail to pay their Rates liability despite recovery action by the Council and repeated requests for payment. Where this is the case, the names of any sole traders will be removed from any details provided.
In order to ensure that this policy remains appropriate, it will be kept under review and formally updated every 5 years.