How we calculate your Council Tax bill

1. Council decision: Kirklees Council reviews its budget annually and decides how much to increase Council Tax to cover its costs. This decision is based on factors like inflation, changes in government funding, and the cost of providing services.
2. Percentage increase: The council sets a percentage increase for the year.
3. Application to bands: This percentage increase is applied to all property valuation bands (A to H).

Example Council Tax increase calculation

If the basic Council Tax (with no police, fire or parish precepts included) for a Band D property is £1,600 and the council decides on a 4.99% increase:

• Current basic charge: £1,600
• Increase: 4.99% of £1,600 = £79.84
• New basic charge: £1,600 + £79.84 = £1,679.84

Separate precepts

In addition to the main Council Tax set by Kirklees, there are separate charges (precepts) for services like fire and rescue, police, and parish councils. Each of these services can decide on their own percentage increase, which is then added to your overall Council Tax bill.

Combined total

The increase from all these services are combined with the main Council Tax increase to determine the total amount you need to pay. This means that your final bill reflects all the individual increases.

Example combined calculation

If your current Council Tax bill includes:

• Basic charge: £1,600 (with a 4.99% increase)
• Police precept: £200 (with a 2% increase)
• Fire precept: £100 (with a 1.5% increase)

The new amounts would be:

• Local authority: £1,600 + 4.99% = £1,679.84
• Police precept: £200 + 2% = £204
• Fire precept: £100 + 1.5% = £101.50

So the new Council Tax bill would be:

Total = £1,679.84 (basic charge) + £204 (police precept) + £101.50 (fire precept) = £1,985.34

A parish precept has not been added in this example because not all parishes in Kirklees have one. You can find the precept charges along with further information at How much we charge per Council Tax band.