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Small business rate relief

Relief from non-domestic rates is available that may reduce the amount of rates that small businesses have to pay.

Criteria for small business rate relief

Relief is available to ratepayers who occupy:

a) only one business property in England with a rateable value below £18,000, or
b) one main business property and other additional properties, providing all the additional properties have individual rateable values below £2,600 and the total of the rateable values of all the properties is under £18,000 - relief will apply to the main property only. 

There are two elements to the relief - eligible businesses will qualify for relief as follows;

a) the rate bill will be calculated using the small business non-domestic rating multiplier for all eligible properties with a rateable value below £18,000, and  
b) businesses with rateable values below £6,000 will get relief of 50% of their liability while this relief will be reduced by 1% for every £120 of rateable value for businesses with rateable values between £6,001 and £12,000.

The multipliers for each financial year are as follows:

If the ratepayer applies & qualifies for Small Business Rates Relief they will pay on the following multiplier:

Where a property is eligible for charitable relief and small business relief, charitable relief only will apply. Where a property is eligible for rural rate relief and small business rate relief, rural rate relief only will apply. Any transitional relief will be applied before any small business rate relief is applied.  

Further information

More information on Small Business Rate Relief and details of rateable values for every property can be found on the My Business Rates website.

Relief may be given on application as long as it has been received by 30 September 2010 in respect of the financial year 2007/2008 onwards (unless the rateable value is later reduced to below £15,000 on appeal).  For example, if we receive your application 1 April 2010 we will be able to backdate the relief to 1 April 2007 as long as you fulfil the relevant criteria.  .

How to apply

To apply for Small Business Rate Relief please contact the Business Rates Team to request an application form. Or you can download the application form below.

Contact details

Downloadable documents