Council Tax

Other

I recently purchased a B2L. At the time of viewing the elderly couple had moved out into a home. There is a lot of work need doing at the property and with 2 months in, with lockdown and covid it work taking longer to complete. I applied for council tax exemption and I have just been informed that the previous owners had already applied for exemption. In fact it will be almost two years the property will be in a couple of months time and so double council tax will apply! Should I have been made aware of this before? Is there anything I can do?