Several key online services run by Durham County Council will be unavailable from late Monday afternoon until Tuesday morning while essential system updates are carried out. Council Tax, business rates, housing benefit, and Crisis and Resilience funding applications and accounts will all be inaccessible from 4.30pm on Monday 22 June 2026 until 8.30am on Tuesday 23 June 2026.
The works mean residents will be unable to submit new claims, check balances, or make payments for those services during the 16-hour window. A banner alerting the public to the closure has been placed across multiple pages of the council’s website including the homepage, Online Services hub, and Council Tax area.
Similar planned maintenance has taken the same systems offline before. The council’s website underwent a comparable upgrade between 4.30pm on Friday 27 February 2026 and 8.30am on Monday 2 March, while shorter early-morning work took place in April and May 2026, typically between 7.30am and 8am. Residents who need help during the outage can still call the general enquiries line on 03000 26 0000, which operates 8.30am to 5pm Monday to Thursday and 8.30am to 4.30pm on Fridays—though the maintenance window runs into Tuesday morning, meaning the phone service will be available when lines open. A text messaging service is also offered on 0786 009 3073.
Specialist teams can be reached directly for the affected services once phone lines reopen: the Council Tax team on 03000 26 4000, business rates on 03000 268 997, and the benefits team on 03000 26 2000. While those core financial services are offline, Durham County Council’s other digital tools—including its DoItOnline reporting function for issues such as fly-tipping, dog fouling, street lighting faults, and potholes—remain available throughout.
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