Save content
Have you found this content useful? Use the button above to save it to your profile.
Thinkstock/Prykhodov

Businesses need to appeal rates bills now

by
12th Feb 2015
Save content
Have you found this content useful? Use the button above to save it to your profile.

Rebecca Cave warns businesses to submit appeals against business rates bills before 1 April 2015 to avoid losing backdated refunds.

Business rates may be the third biggest expense, after staffing costs and rent, for many businesses, so it is important to challenge any demands which appear excessive or unreasonable for the trading premises.

This year business owners have to work against the clock to submit a valid rates appeal, as the government has imposed a deadline of 31 March 2015 on backdated revaluation claims for commercial properties in England. As business rates are a devolved tax the deadlines for rates appeals may be different in Scotland and Wales. Northern Ireland has a completely different system of rates for domestic and commercial properties.  

There is also extra pressure on business rates in England, as from 1 April 2013 local councils have been allowed to keep 50% of any increase in business rates collected in their areas, instead of passing that amount on to central government.

The next revaluation of commercial properties for rates purposes is due to come into effect from 1 April 2017, and the Valuation Office is already sending out forms to ratepayers to collect information for that revaluation exercise. So in order to raise more money from the same value of commercial properties the local councils have to be more imaginative. 

Recently local councils, with the backing of the Valuation Office Agency, have changed the rates assessment for cashpoints (ATMs) located inside stores. Previously these machines were counted as part of the overall rating for the premises, but now the cashpoint is rated separately. Each ATM could attract a rates bill of around £3,600 according to the FT.

Many supermarkets have received business rates bills for in-store ATMs covering several years. The large retailers have the resources to appeal against these bills, but smaller businesses may not realise that time is running out to submit an appeal. 

In the 2014 Autumn Statement, the Chancellor announced that any business rates appeal submitted after 1 April 2015 will not be backdated to the period 2010 to 2015. Thus if the business submits an appeal on 1 April 2015 or later, and the rateable value of their property is reduced following the appeal, that business will lose out on all the potential refunds of business rates for the five years from 1 April 2010 to 31 March 2015.

If you are unhappy that your competitors appear to get away with paying little or rates, you can add your comments to a consultation into avoidance of business rates.

The closing date for this consultation is 28 February 2015, and you can reply by email.   

Rebecca Cave is the joint author of Capital Gains Tax Reliefs for SMEs and Entrepreneurs 2014/15 published by Bloomsbury Professional.

Replies (0)

Please login or register to join the discussion.

There are currently no replies, be the first to post a reply.