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Rating Talking Heads: September

CCA Operational Reforms: Recent Developments that will Aid Practitioners

This event runs as an informal discussion with a small panel of leading and informed practitioners extracting the nuances from the monthly topic. They discuss practical issues that arise, with participants in the meeting being encouraged to listen, join in, ask questions and share comments. 

Module Duration: 1 hour 5 minutes

Recorded: 20/09/21

Areas covered

Please note there are no slides accompanying this recording. 


CCA reforms introduced in 2017 have proved challenging for practitioners in both public and the private sector. 


Whilst the May episode of Talking Heads focused on CCA, there have been some significant developments during the summer which came out of the earlier event and have since been discussed between the VOA and the Professional Bodies (RICS, IRRV and RSA).  


These developments promise to improve the user experience for ratepayers and their advisors. Hence, we are bring you CCA part 2 for September.


This session explores:

  • Role of Group Pre-Challenge Reviews (GPCRs) and what is expected of them? 
  • What is the status of a challenge where the unit of assessment may also be in question – for example following PICO?
  • “Unlawful” and “incomplete” challenges – what are these and how to deal with them?
  • Rent of the appeal property to be included in challenge documents – what needs to be provided and what does not?
  • What to do if the rent quoted does not match VOA records?
  • How to deal with nil rents under API?
  • Leases or Forms of Return to prove rents?
  • When should extensions be accepted during the challenge stage?
  • Contact at challenge stage – how and when should this happen?
  • What are reasonable time periods for providing further information?
  • How do ratepayers’ advisors challenge where reason for refusal is wrong/tenuous? Should there be a right to appeal and what time limits would be constructive?
  • Check stage issues:
    • What to do about a “no action” response when a legitimate value matrix change or factual change is notified.
    • When check decisions notified late or not at all. 

September's Talking Heads