Small business rate relief

Who can claim Small Business Rate Relief?

From 1 April 2017 any ratepayer who occupies a single non-domestic property within England, where the rateable value is less than £51,000 will be entitled to the following relief:

Rateable Value of main property Period Amount of Small Business Rate Relief
£12,000 or less 01.04.2017 100%
£12,001 to £15,000 01.04.2017 100% to 0% on a scale of 1% for every £30.00 RV over £12,000
£15,000 to £51,000 01.04.2017 Small Business Rate Multiplier only

 

Rating Multiplier

The small business non-domestic rate multiplier for 2021-22 is 49.9 pence in the pound

The national non-domestic rate multiplier for 2021-22 is 51.2 pence in the pound

Since 1 April 2012 eligible properties with Rateable Values between £12,001 and £17,999 automatically had their rates calculated using the lower Small Business Rate multiplier instead of the standard National Non-Domestic multiplier.

From 1 April 2017 eligible properties with rateable values between £15,001 and £51,000 will automatically have their rates calculated using the lower Small Business Rate multiplier instead of the standard National Non-Domestic multiplier.

 

Additional properties

Where a ratepayer occupies a main property with a rateable value of less than £15,000 from 1 April 2017 but has additional properties with individual rateable values of less than £2,900 the relief will only be applied to the main property. The additional properties will be disregarded for relief purposes, but will be liable for the full rates bill. If the aggregate total of all the rateable values is more than £19,999 from 1 April 2017, Small Business Rate Relief will not apply, even to the main property.

If a ratepayer is in occupation of more than one property, and the rateable value of both properties is more than £2,899 from 1 April 2017, Small Business Rate Relief will not apply to either property. However, the Government has introduced additional support to small businesses. For those businesses that take on an additional property which would normally have meant the loss of Small Business Rate Relief, the Government has confirmed that they will be allowed to keep the relief for a maximum of 12 months.

 

Small business rate relief online form

Application for small business rate relief
  • Before you Start
  • About the Business
  • Other Business Premises
  • Other Properties
  • Declaration
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Small business rate relief conditions

This application must be completed by the ratepayer or a person authorised to sign on behalf of the ratepayer. The means, where the ratepayer is:
a partnership, partner of that partnership
a trust, a trustee of that trust
a body corporate, a director of that body, and
in any other case, a person duly authorised to sign on behalf of the ratepayer.
NB: in the case of a Limited Company the application must be signed by a director.

Please refer to the table on our website for the levels of Small Business Rate Relief entitlement.

Check your Rateable Value

The relief will be applied to the highest rateable value property.

Further details of the scheme can be found on Small Business Rate Relief page
Ratepayers will only be required to apply for Small Business Rate Relief once between each revaluation of non-domestic assessments.

An additional condition of entitlement is that the ratepayer must notify the Local Authority of particular changes in circumstances that may affect their entitlement to the relief, within 4 weeks from the date that the change occurred.

These changes are:
increases in the rateable value of a property occupied by the ratepayer which is not in the area of the Local Authority granting Small Business Relief;
the ratepayer coming into occupation of any property which has not been mentioned in their application for relief.
If your business ceases to be eligible on a day during the year in question, the relief will cease on that day.

You must submit your application for the relief to the Council within six months of the end of the valuation period to which it relates.

Apply by post

Please print and send to the address below.

Small business relief - printable PDF