Business rates

A quality service

Our commitment to you - to reduce poverty and provide excellent financial services for our customers.

We aim to make our revenue service:

• exceed your expectations
• a service that people want to come to

Collecting business rates

This charter sets out:

• our commitment for the service we deliver
• the standards you should expect from us
• how you can help us achieve and maintain these standards

We have a duty to collect business rates from all ratepayers

We will:

• give you at least 14 days' notice of the first instalment becoming due
• provide a variety of flexible payment methods
• make payment arrangements with you if you are in financial difficulty (see how to contact us)
• take action within business rates law if you do not pay on time

The standards you can expect from us

We will:

• send out accurate business rates bills
• collect business rates quickly and efficiently
• deal with your enquiries quickly and efficiently
• provide clear and up-to-date information
• help you understand your rights and responsibilities
• apologise if we make a mistake
• work to improve our standards and the service we provide

We will also listen to your views

• We welcome your views on the service you receive from us, as they will give us vital feedback on our performance
• We are committed to making changes to improve our service where we can. We will be pleased to receive your comments, whether they are compliments or criticisms
• A senior manager will investigate formal complaints, and then tell you the results
• If you want details of our complaints procedure, please ask us or contact the Council House

What you can expect from our staff

Our staff will:

• be well trained
• be helpful, patient, polite and fair
• make every effort to answer your questions
• tell you your rights
• explain business rates law in plain language
• give their name when you ask for it
• provide or arrange help in a number of languages.

You can help us achieve our standards by:

• being polite when dealing with staff
• giving us complete and accurate information
• paying your business rates on time so that the payment is in your account by the due date
• contacting us as soon as possible if you are having difficulties in making payments
• telling us about changes to your circumstances that might affect how much business rates you have to pay; and telling us if you don't think we have kept to this charter.