A NEW system to catch council tax cheats could save Kirklees Council £900,000 a year.

The council has tried out a scheme in selected areas which checks whether people receiving a single person’s discount on their council tax are really living alone.

The scheme was piloted for eight weeks from July this year, targeting 5,000 homes in Huddersfield.

It allowed the council to remove some single person discounts, meaning they can charge £80,000 in extra council tax this year.

Council officers hope to have this money collected by March 2009.

About 6% of the 5,000 homes had their 25% discount removed – and officers predict that if 6% of all Kirklees homes are taken off the discount list an £900,000 a year will be collected in council tax.

Clr Andrew Palfreeman, cabinet member for finance, said: “There has been a group of people in Huddersfield who have been shocked to find that if they have been claiming single person discount on council tax and they shouldn’t have been, we have been able to point out the error of their ways. It’s been a very successful pilot.”

The test scheme, which cost £15,500, involved comparing the 5,000 selected council tax accounts with an Experian database, which showed information indicating how many people were resident at each property.

In 3,942 homes, the single person discount was confirmed as correct.

A total of 1,058 homes were flagged up as potentially having more than one adult resident.

Forms were sent out to these homes. Those that declared they were no longer living alone had their discount removed from the date they provided – or April 1 2008 if no date was given.

If the person said they were still the only resident, and the Experian score was less than 35, they kept their discount.

If they claimed to still be living alone and the score was 35 or higher, the discount was taken away.

In all cases where forms were not returned, the discount was removed.

The council’s cabinet voted on Wednesdayto finance the scheme Kirklees-wide.

Clr Palfreeman said: “Extending the scheme will save us an additional £900,000 per year, which is well in excess of the cost of the exercise.

“The important message to everyone in Kirklees is that if you are claiming single person discount when you should no longer be claiming, now is the time to hold your hands up.

“If you don’t, we will find out and you could get a bill going back a number of years.”