The Bill Behind the Assessment: Reviewing Your 2026 Business Rates Demand

Business rates occupy an odd position in the overheads column. They are substantial, they are unavoidable in the ordinary course, and they are one of the very few costs a company can lawfully dispute after the invoice has been issued. Yet the overwhelming majority of demands are paid without a second look, and budgets are set by rolling forward last year's figure with a modest uplift. Given that a revaluation has now taken effect in England, that habit deserves examination.

Since 1 April 2026 a new rating list has been in force, with rateable values struck against the rental market as it stood on 1 April 2024. Billing authorities have been issuing revised demands through the autumn, and directors are now seeing the practical consequence of a valuation exercise conducted two years ago. Some bills have fallen. Some have risen sharply. A number contain assumptions about the property that the occupier has never seen, let alone verified.

The demand is a conclusion, not an explanation

A rates bill is arithmetic dressed as an instruction. It multiplies a rateable value by a multiplier and then subtracts any reliefs. Three components, each of which can be checked independently. When a demand looks wrong, the error is almost never in the multiplication; it sits in the rateable value, in the description of the hereditament, or in a relief that has not been applied.

Directors tend to treat the bill as a single number to be funded. It is better treated as three numbers to be tested.

Start with the record, not the total

The Valuation Office Agency (VOA) publishes the entry for each property. Before querying anything, obtain that record and read it alongside the bill. You are looking for four things: the description of the property, the floor areas recorded, the effective date, and any note of plant and machinery or other additions folded into the valuation.

Descriptions matter more than they appear to. An entry reading "shop and premises" may be carrying an assumption about storage, yard space or upper floors that does not reflect how the building is actually used. Where a business has reconfigured a unit — closing off a first floor, surrendering a yard, subletting a self-contained section — the valuation may not have caught up.

Measure the areas, or have someone measure them

Floor area is the single most common source of overassessment. Mezzanines counted at full rate, areas shared with a neighbouring occupier, covered yards treated as sales space, car parking or advertising rights valued as part of the main hereditament. If the VOA record states a figure, someone should physically check it against a measured plan. On a warehouse or a large retail unit, a discrepancy of a few per cent is worth several thousand pounds a year, compounded across the life of the list.

Where the property has changed since April 2024 — an extension, a demolition, a change of use — that is a material consideration and should be raised rather than absorbed.

Confirm which multiplier is being used

England operates two multipliers. The small business multiplier applies to properties with a rateable value below £51,000; the standard multiplier applies above that threshold. Confirm that the bill uses the correct one, and that the calculation is consistent with any other properties you occupy.

If your rateable value sits just under the threshold, pay particular attention. Taking on a second site can push the aggregate above the limit, withdraw the small business multiplier from the main property, and remove small business rate relief at the same time. That is a decision to take before a lease is signed, not after the first bill arrives.

Reliefs are not always automatic

Small business rate relief is generally applied by the billing authority without an application, but it is applied on the basis of the information held. If your circumstances have changed, or if the authority's records are out of date, it can be missing. The relief runs at 100 per cent up to a rateable value of £12,000 and tapers to nil at £15,000.

Beyond that, check each relief individually. Temporary retail, hospitality and leisure relief has been extended and amended repeatedly, and the percentage available for 2026-27 should be confirmed against the current guidance rather than assumed. Empty property relief runs for three months on retail and office premises and six months on industrial, but occupation — however brief — resets the clock. Charitable relief, improvement relief and any transitional or supporting small business arrangements should each be visible on the bill. If a relief you expect is absent, ask for it in writing.

The clock on check and challenge

Since the reform of the appeals system, the route is staged: a check to confirm the facts, a challenge if the facts are right but the valuation is disputed, and an appeal to the Valuation Tribunal if the challenge is not resolved. Each stage has its own requirements and evidence.

For the 2026-27 year, the window for submitting a check closes on 31 March 2027. That is the hard deadline, and it does not move because a director was busy. Long before it, however, there is a softer and more useful deadline: the point at which you set next year's budget. A check raised in February is a different proposition from one raised in November, when there is time to gather measured plans, lease documents, comparable rental evidence and a trading record.

A note on cold callers

Revaluation years attract a predictable wave of rating agents offering no-win, no-fee reviews. Some are competent and regulated; others are not. Before signing anything, confirm professional accreditation, understand exactly how the fee is calculated on any refund, and remember that a reduction secured on one basis can be revisited — a valuation can move in both directions.

What to put in the diary before the year turns

Four actions, none of them onerous. Download the VOA record for each property. Measure the areas or commission a measured survey. Tick off every relief line by line against current guidance. And decide, on the evidence, whether a check is warranted.

Then rebuild the rates line in the budget from the revised figure rather than last year's. Where the increase is material, remember that instalments can be spread across twelve months on request rather than ten, and that rates remain an allowable deduction for corporation tax purposes.

Rates are rarely the largest cost on the profit and loss account, but they are among the least examined. A revaluation is the moment when that examination is most likely to produce a return.