Birmingham Council Tax Discounts and Exemptions: Single Person, Students and Empty Properties

Discounts and Exemptions Are Separate from Council Tax Support

Council Tax Support (CTS) is the means-tested reduction for people on low incomes. Discounts and exemptions are statutory entitlements that apply regardless of income — and they're applied to your bill before CTS is calculated. That means you can stack them: a single person on a low income gets the 25% discount first, then CTS is calculated on the reduced amount.

Understanding which ones you're entitled to matters because missing a discount inflates the base figure that everything else is calculated from.

The 25% Single Person Discount

If you're the only adult counted for council tax purposes in your property, you get a 25% reduction on your bill. In Birmingham, that cuts a Band D charge from £2,353.17 to £1,764.88 for 2026/27.

"Only adult" doesn't mean you live completely alone. Certain people are disregarded — they don't count towards the number of adults in the property:

• Full-time students (enrolled on a full-time higher-education course requiring at least 21 hours of study per week for at least 24 weeks a year)
• Severely mentally impaired people (with a medical certificate and qualifying benefit)
• Live-in carers looking after someone who isn't their spouse, partner, or child under 18
• People in detention or prison
• 18 and 19-year-olds still in full-time education or who have just left school
• Diplomats and certain international visitors

So if you live with an adult child who is a full-time university student, they're disregarded and you qualify for the single person discount.

Apply through the Citizen Access Portal or call Birmingham City Council. The discount can be backdated — the council will typically backdate to when the qualifying circumstances started, provided you can evidence it.

Full Student Exemption

A property occupied entirely by full-time students is exempt from council tax altogether. This covers purpose-built student accommodation and shared houses where every resident is a qualifying student.

If one non-student adult lives in a student household, the exemption falls away but the single person discount may apply if only one non-student resident counts.

Students need to provide a council tax exemption certificate from their university or college. Most Birmingham universities issue these automatically through their student portals.

Empty Property Rules

Most empty properties in Birmingham are charged full Council Tax whether furnished or unfurnished; there is no general one-month Class C exemption. A 100% premium applies when a property has been empty and substantially unfurnished for one year or more, rising to 200% after five years and 300% after ten years.

If the property is empty because the owner has moved permanently into hospital or a care home for treatment, a Class E exemption may apply.

There is no general 12-month Council Tax exemption for an empty property undergoing structural repairs. If it is unoccupied and major works make it uninhabitable, you can ask the VOA whether its Council Tax band can be removed; that is different from an empty-property exemption.

How Discounts Interact with Council Tax Support

The order matters. Birmingham applies reductions to your bill in this sequence:

1. Statutory discounts (single person discount, student exemption)
2. Disabled band reduction (if applicable)
3. Council Tax Support (means-tested award)
4. Discretionary hardship payments

Your CTS award is calculated on the net liability after discounts — so claiming your discount first maximises the effective value of both. A single person in a Band A property with the 25% discount and full CTS under the protected track could owe nothing at all.

Claiming What You're Owed

Many Birmingham households claim CTS but miss the discount, or claim the discount but don't realise they also qualify for CTS. The Birmingham Council Tax Reduction guide walks through every available reduction in the order the council applies them, so you can check each one against your household's situation and claim anything you've missed.

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