Bank and service provider apologise for causing Council Tax payment issue
At last night’s Overview and Scrutiny Committee, 27 November 2025, members considered the findings and recommendations from the cross-party Task and Finish Group established to review the September Council Tax and Business Rates direct debit incident, in which thousands of residents were charged twice.
On Monday 17 November 2025, the Group examined the detailed report, spoke with officers involved at the time, reviewed how the error occurred, and assessed the actions taken both immediately after the incident and in the months since. Members also noted and welcomed the formal letter of apology issued by the Bank, along with the apology from the third-party payment service provider responsible for the technical failure.
The Group concluded that the incident was not caused by any wrongdoing by Council staff or colleagues in Publica (its shared service organisation). Instead, it resulted from a technical error within the third-party supplier’s payment system. An outdated payment process, which should have been permanently archived during a system upgrade, was mistakenly reactivated at the same time the new process went live. This produced duplicate direct debit requests. In addition, banking fail-safes did not identify the issue at the time. Both failures have been fully investigated, and corrective measures have since been implemented to prevent a recurrence.
The Strategic Overview and Scrutiny Committee endorsed the recommendations from the Task and Finish Group for Cabinet consideration, ensuring continued improvements in the administration of Council Tax and Business Rates.
Cllr John Francis, Chair of the Scrutiny Task and Finish Group, said:
“This incident understandably caused concern for many residents, and it was important that we fully understood what went wrong. The Group is satisfied that the error originated within the banking and payment systems and not within the Council.
"We welcome the steps now taken by the bank and supplier to prevent this from happening again, and we are pleased to have received their formal apologies. Our focus now is on ensuring the Council continues to strengthen its oversight and communication processes so residents can have complete confidence in future payments.”
Cllr Andy Moore, Cabinet Member for Finance at Forest of Dean District Council said:
"I am grateful for the work of the Scrutiny task and finish group and support their conclusions. I would like to thank all the teams involved that worked extremely hard to rectify the problem as quickly as they did, as well as residents for their patience.
"Errors of this kind are extremely rare, and Direct Debit remains a safe, convenient and reliable way to pay Council Tax and Business Rates.”
View full report: https://meetings.fdean.gov.uk/documents/g5623/Public%20reports%20pack%2027th-Nov-2025%2018.00%20Overview%20and%20Scrutiny%20Committee.pdf?T=10