Appealing a benefit decision

A written explanation of the reasons for our decision provides you with more detail about the rules we follow when we made the decision.

You must ask for this within one month of the date that you received your decision notice.

If you don’t agree with the way we worked out your benefit, you can ask us to look at it again. This is known as a ‘reconsideration’.

If the original decision is wrong, we will change it. 

You must ask for this within one month of the date that you received your decision notice.

We will write to you and tell you why we are unable to change our decision. If you still do not agree with our decision you can appeal to an independent tribunal. An appeal tribunal is like a court of law.

Housing benefit appeals

Appeals against Housing Benefit decisions are dealt with by the HM Courts and Tribunal Service.

An appeal to the Tribunal service must:

• Be in writing and signed by the person making the appeal

• Be delivered to the Council offices

• State your name and address

• Provide the name and address of any representative and an address for the appeal documents to be sent

• State what is being appealed

• Give the grounds for your appeal

• Be within one month of the date of our decision or reconsideration of your benefit

If your appeal is late you will need to give the reasons why it is late. If we decide that we are unable to accept your appeal, we will submit your request to the Tribunal who will decide if your late appeal can be accepted. An appeal cannot be considered if it is more than 13 months late.

We will send to both you and the Tribunal details of:

• Your appeal

• The relevant law

• The reasons for our decision

Read the appeal papers carefully. If you do not understand something, then ask us, an advice centre or a solicitor to explain. We can send you a list of local advice centres.

The Tribunal will then contact you directly with a form to complete to allow the appeal to proceed.

Further information is available from GOV.UK

Council tax support appeal

Appeals against Council Tax Support decisions are dealt with by the Valuation Tribunal. They will only consider your appeal after we have looked at your claim again and decided we are unable to change our original decision.

You can appeal to them against our decision about:

• whether you are entitled to a council tax reduction

• how much council tax reduction the council has awarded you under the local scheme

The Tribunal is unable to hear appeals about the contents of our Council Tax Support scheme, only about the way the scheme has been applied to your individual case.

For further information and to make an appeal, please visit Valuation Tribunal Service.