Form

CTR1/CTR2: Council Tax requirement return - data upload guidance

Updated 6 February 2025

Applies to England

Introduction

This guidance is applicable for:

• Billing Authorities completing the CTR1 form and parish submissions
• Precepting authorities completing the CTR2 form

If you are responsible for the CTR3 (GLA) or CTR4 (Greater Manchester CA, South Yorkshire MCA, West Yorkshire CA or  York and North Yorkshire CA) form, then data needs to be directly entered into the DELTA system.

We have provided equivalent CTR1 and CTR2 forms in Excel to authorities, so authorities can  complete the form in Excel and upload the workbook to DELTA if they wish. We would recommend that the upload facility is used where billing authorities have multiple parishes and local precepting authorities. Calculations and validation checks based on these figures will be performed in the template so that they can be checked before data is uploaded into DELTA. If there are any outstanding validation checks, these forms will be saved rather than submitted.

Manual entry directly into DELTA is still available, and manual entry after the data has been uploaded can take place (for example, to change the data uploaded). However, any upload following manual entry will overwrite these changes.

Please read and follow the guidance carefully.

For the CTR1 form, saving the workbook as a .xlsx file will be necessary to upload the data to DELTA. The same file can be used to upload the data for the CTR1 submission and for the CTR1 Parish data submission.

For the CTR2 form, the workbook will also need to be saved as a .xlsx file for a successful data upload.

It is important to note that when uploading data to DELTA, some authorities may experience issues at both the upload and validation stages of the process. When experiencing an error here, the DELTA team recommends that authorities retry the file upload. If there are issues at the validation stage i.e., the system suggesting that rows are invalid, then we recommended continuing to the import stage of the upload. Once authorities have uploaded their workbook, validated the data, and started the import, the data will be processed in the DELTA system. It is worth noting that once the Import has started, this will continue in the background even if you get logged out or navigate away from the page.

This guide is for bulk upload via the CTR Excel Workbook and not for XML / API uploads. If you want to enter data directly into Delta, see submit data.

1. Find and complete the CTR Excel Workbook, and save as a .xlsx file.

2. Sign in to Delta. Once you have signed in,  you will be taken  to the Welcome Page.

3. Under ‘Open collections’, find the CTR collection and click ‘View collection’. You will then see a page for the collection.

4. At the bottom of the page, you will see a section for returns. Select ‘Bulk upload’.

5. Select ‘Upload data’ in the dropdown menu. Choose ‘Select file’ and select the CTR Excel Workbook from your computer or drag and drop the file in the box.

6. Once you have selected the file, a green box at the bottom will say ‘Upload complete’. The file is now uploaded, but it still needs to be checked for errors and imported into the system. Select ‘Next’. This will take you to the validation page which will tell you if your data is valid or invalid. In some instances, this first upload can fail. We recommend retrying in the first instance.

7. This will then start the DELTA validation. Be aware this may take a minute or two depending on how much data is being loaded. You will need to wait until a yellow text box appears.

• If it is valid, it means Delta cannot find errors on the data. It will be imported, and its status will be ‘Submitted’. You can still view or edit the form in the datastore. Once your data has been successfully submitted, you will receive a confirmation email. You can follow the ‘view completed results’ link to go to the data store.

• If it says ‘x out of x document is invalid’ this means there are data problems, or further review or explanatory comments are required before it can be submitted.  Please continue with the upload. It will show as ‘Saved’ rather than submitted. You will then need to edit the form later to resolve the issues and submit. In some cases, the system can suggest that all documents are invalid on upload. We recommend that authorities continue with the import stage where this is the case.

8. Click ‘Next’ to proceed to import the record.

• If there are existing records previously uploaded or submitted for this collection for your organisation, you will be asked if you want to ‘Keep’ or ‘Delete’ before you ‘Start Import’. Please select the ‘Delete’ option, as there can only be one record for the CTR1/CTR2 collection.
• The imported data will overwrite any existing data. This includes replacing previously reported values with blanks if these cells have been left blank in the re-uploaded template and overwriting changes made directly into DELTA.
• If presented with an option to ‘Import’ or ‘Skip’, select the ‘Import’ option, not the ‘Skip’ option.

9. Click on ‘Start import’. Once the Import has started, this will continue in the background even if you get logged out or navigate away from the page.

10. A message in a green box will appear to say the import of the document is complete. Click on ‘Close’ to check your data. You will go to the data store page, where you can view or edit the record by selecting ‘more’. Use the filter ‘Status’ to view only ‘Saved’ records, which have not been submitted. If you edit the record, you can view the error and submit.

(Please note that the yellow text box will say ‘x out of x document is invalid’ if there are any data problems or if any further review or explanatory comments are required. These are required in cases such as where data supplied are different from pre-populated values, most commonly if there is a significant change from the previous year. Please continue with the upload. In some cases, the system can suggest that all documents are invalid on upload. We recommend that authorities continue with the import stage where this is the case.)

11. To ensure that authorities are satisfied with the data that has been uploaded to the DELTA system, you will be required to answer a checkbox to confirm whether you have used the bulk upload facility.

12. Once you have successfully submitted your data, you will get an email confirmation.

Submitting the form/dealing with validations

• Each parish will be saved/submitted on DELTA as a separate record. If you need to amend data for specific parishes or provide additional validation comments you can do so via their individual records rather than completing another bulk upload.

• To review, manually edit, and submit the data you must go into the form in DELTA. To do this click on ‘More’ and choose ‘Edit form’.

• Please address any validation warnings and errors e.g., by adding in explanations, and then completing your return by pressing on the green ‘Submit’ button at the foot of the form. Please note that some validation warnings may not show up until you attempt to submit the form.

What to do if you need to bulk upload again

• If you need to carry out an additional bulk upload, DELTA has the capability to re-upload data. Follow the steps above.

Be Aware: A bulk upload will replace all data and comments, and therefore you will need to fill in explanations again to satisfy error flags. Therefore, you may prefer to make changes directly in DELTA.

Queries

• If you have any queries regarding bulk upload, please email us at ctr.statistics@communities.gov.uk.