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Council Tax legal question

Were you charged a liability order fee or costs when your council applied for a liability order?

If you paid Council Tax summons or liability-order costs, the charge is not automatically lawful merely because it appeared on the council paperwork. The council must be able to justify the qualifying costs under the statutory scheme.

In brief

You may have a repayment argument, but it depends on the cost and the timing.

Regulation 34 allows a billing authority to recover costs reasonably incurred in connection with the application and in obtaining a liability order. The courts have made clear that the costs must actually have been incurred, must have a sufficient causal connection with the liability-order process, and must be reasonable for the authority to incur. The fact that a charge was standardised across thousands of cases does not automatically make it unlawful, but the authority needs a defensible cost basis.

Why the date you paid can matter

In R (Morley) v Surrey Heath Borough Council [2025] EWHC 1678 (Admin), the High Court held that it was unlawful to make a pre-hearing summons demand using a calculation that included the additional costs of applying for liability orders where those later-stage costs had not yet been incurred. The court nevertheless refused to quash the particular summons and liability order for other reasons, including alternative remedies and the likely outcome.

If you paid the council tax and the demanded costs after the summons but before the liability-order hearing, that timing should therefore be recorded accurately.

What Nicolson established

In R (Nicolson) v Tottenham Magistrates [2015] EWHC 1252 (Admin), the High Court said the magistrates must be satisfied that the council actually incurred the costs, that they were incurred in obtaining the liability order, and that it was reasonable to incur them. The case also emphasised the need for sufficient information about how the figure was calculated.

Does the new £100 cap mean older charges over £100 are automatically refundable?

No. Government announced in 2026 that it intends to cap costs added for seeking liability orders at £100 from April 2027 through secondary legislation. As at 5 September 2026, that cap is not yet in force. Historic charges need to be considered under the law and facts applicable at the time, not by simply applying the future cap retrospectively.

What should I gather?

The council tax summons and any liability order paperwork

Your council tax account history and payment dates

The amount charged for summons or liability-order costs in each year

Any council breakdown, cost model, FOI response or explanation of the charge

Reclaim your liability order costs

If you have the dates and amounts, or even only part of them, use the Fenton Marsh generator to build an OPEN repayment request and a conditional document pack. Multiple historic episodes can be entered in one session.

Check my costs and build the pack

What if the liability order still exists?

Do not assume that a County Court money claim is the correct way to undo a subsisting magistrates court liability order. The route for addressing an extant order may need to be considered first. The generator separates that situation and warns against treating a normal money claim as a collateral attack on the order.

Official starting points

Nicolson [2015] EWHC 1252 (Admin)Morley [2025] EWHC 1678 (Admin)Government response on council tax administration, 2026

Important

General information for England only; not advice on an individual case. Whether money is recoverable can depend on the wording of the demand, the council's actual cost evidence, timing, limitation and whether a liability order remains in force.