London Borough of Ealing have inadvertently charged many residents twice this month for Council Tax due to an error. This resulted in many people who are paying by direct debit being double charged.

The Council say that those people affected were immediately recredited, however it is likely that some people were sent into overdraft because the banks would not have cleared the funds immediately.

The system has been unreliable in the past and this is not the first time residents have been double billed.

In a statement given at last week's council meeting, Leader of the Council Jason Stacey said "On Monday 17 July, around 34,000 residents were incorrectly charged for Council Tax because the council processed its direct debits file incorrectly.  The error was noticed that day and immediate action was taken to make full refunds. Residents' bank accounts were credited by the end of Tuesday."

He went on to say that "The council will fully refund anyone who has had to pay bank charges as a result of this error and no-one will be out of pocket. It is too early to accurately identify the number of refunds necessary.  But we estimate there will be a few dozen rather than hundreds, because of the prompt action taken to rectify the matter. Obviously we will be clearer as and when the claims come in. A number has been advertised for people to call and we have people on hand to deal with what has happened. We have received 400 phone calls about this so far."

"On behalf of the council I wish to apologise to anyone who has been inconvenienced by this and I will take every step to ensure this will not happen again. While I did not push the button, I take full responsibility on behalf of the council for this error and I believe in standing up and saying so."

Conservative Councillor Barbara Yerolemou, added "We are of course instigating a review to see how this was possible and to make sure that there are more preventative measures to stop this happening again."

If you incurred bank charges as a result of this Council error please phone Ealing Council on 020 8825 5000 and request a refund.

July 26, 2006