Business Rates Appeals – What’s The Rush?

The successful appeal on behalf of York Museums Trust has generated a lot of media interest… but little museum activity. AIM has been working toward this for their membership, with help from Colin Hunter from Lambert Smith Hampton, for many years and now is the time to take advantage of it.

Any appeals against the 2010 Rating List have to be made before the 1st October 2017, and any appeals in Scotland for the 2017 Rating List have to be started before the 1st October 2017 as well. Time is running out…

Colin Hunter has informed us that in England, the transitional relief scheme, affecting increases and decreases in liability from 1st April 2017 is based on the 2010 Rateable Value, and does not have regard to any reliefs.

So, if your museum is facing large increases in liability or small decreases, the 2010 Rateable Value is still affecting your bills, even if you received 100% rates relief in previous years.

Colin has looked at the liability from 1st April 2017 for 6 different museums chosen from the Rating List to fit in with the banding of properties for transitional adjustments which are £1 – £19,999; £20,0000 to £99,999; £100,000+.

The majority of museums are facing increased liabilities due to increased Rateable Values but there are some that are going down so he has picked 3 examples from each and assumed that for arguments sake the values can be reduced by 50% for both the 2010 and 2017 Rating List in order to demonstrate the difference in liability that not appealing the 2010 Rateable Value would have.

This is something of a simplistic approach and for the properties with an increased RV in the 2017 List it may well be that a 50% reduction in the 2010 List will result in a larger percentage reduction in the 2017 RV which would make the added benefit of the 2010 RV reduction even greater in the following years.

He has also looked at one extreme case, Yorkshire Museum.  At the start of the 2010 List it was valued at £106,000, it is now valued at £1 and should be valued at £1 for the 2017 List when it is resolved.

The calculations are set out on a spreadsheet which can be downloaded here: Business Rates Copy of Comparison for savings if no reduction in 2010 List

Based on these calculations, it is clear that it is very important to ensure the 2010 Rateable Value is reduced and not just that the 2017 Rateable Value is correct.

Further Support

For up to date advice on business rates, AIM members can contact Colin Hunter, a Director of Lambert Smith Hampton, who has been working with AIM and some of our members for the last 10 years. Colin has offered to give any AIM member who contacts him 15 minutes consultation, at no fee with no strings attached, so please call 0113 245 8454 or email [email protected] for advice. We also have a Success Guide on Business Rates which can be downloaded HERE.

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