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Ratepayer record

Councils publish the accounts they bill. Most of those accounts name a property we can identify, and they appear on that property's hereditament page. Some do not: the address is written differently, the reference does not match, or the council has not given enough to go on. Those accounts still hold real information — who is being billed, from when, and what reliefs they receive — so they have a page of their own.

You reach one by clicking an unmatched row in a search result, or from the search box, where an unmatched account is marked so you know before you open it.

Why this is not a property page

The header carries an unmatched mark where a property page would show a rateable value. That mark means one thing only: the account could not be tied to an entry on the rating list. It does not mean the property is missing from the list, that the account is wrong, or that anything has been deleted — only that we cannot yet say which entry the two belong to.

Everything on the page is what the council published. We show it as filed, and add nothing.

Account reference

The reference the council uses for this account, shown as they published it. It identifies the account within that council's area, so the same reference can appear in another council's area meaning something else entirely. The page is for one account at one address.

Some councils file a placeholder in this field — a run of zeroes, or a single character — instead of a real reference. Where that happens, the reference tells you nothing, and the address is what holds the page together.

Records

Every record the council has filed for this account, newest publication first. One account is usually filed many times, once per publication, so repeated rows are the ordinary case rather than a sign of anything wrong.

The dates read the same way as they do on a property page: the account date, the occupation date, the record date, the original source (when the file first carrying the row reached us), and the latest source (the most recent file carrying it). Where the council gave no date, the column reads Unpublished rather than showing a blank you might read as a zero.

The highlighted row is the record in force — the one the page speaks for when it names an occupier.

Where the record came from

The squares beside the billing authority read as they do on a property page: how recently a council file carried the record in force, and what the latest file said of it. Here a different record is another record under the same account reference and address, and the track never stops, since the account has no entry on the rating list to be deleted.

Reliefs

The reliefs and charges the council has published against this account. Until now these were held but never shown anywhere, because the account had no property page to show them on; roughly half the unmatched accounts in larger councils carry at least one.

Each relief appears once, with its most recent award. Councils restate an award every time they file, so showing every restatement would read as many awards where there was one.

Where the record in force carries no charges of its own, the page shows those from an earlier publication of the same account and marks them as carried, so you can see that the figure is older than the record above it.

Finding the property

The Potential matches tab helps you find the rating list entry this account should connect to. Each option runs a search you could have run yourself, with the account's own details filled in:

• the account reference, against properties in the same council area
• the postcode, where the council gave one
• the address, as published
• the account name, which finds the other properties this business holds rather than this one

They are ordered by how sharply each narrows the answer. An option only appears where the account carries what it needs — an account with no name does not offer the last one.

Once you have found the property, everything else in openLocal works from there: open its page, add it to a portfolio, or compare it.

Accounts with no address

A small number of accounts are published with no property address at all. The page says so plainly rather than guessing, and the Potential matches tab offers only the options it can still run.

Where a council has filed both a placeholder reference and no address, the page may gather records that are not really one account. We show what was published and claim nothing further; there is no way to separate them from what the council gave us.

If you know the answer

If you can see which property an account belongs to, tell us. We pass corrections back to the council and to our own matching, and an account that is matched once stays matched for everyone.