Gareth Buckley, Principal at Manchester property agency Avison Young, comments:-
Pulling an early Easter bunny out of his hat the Chancellor in his Spring Statement 2018 has announced that the next business rates Revaluation will be 1st April 2021 – one year earlier than the previously announced date of 1st April 2022.
Whilst it seems like good news for ratepayers it looks like the government will continue to have a transitional phasing scheme so any real benefit from decreases in rental values will not be passed on immediately to ratepayers. With the continuing woes on the High Street this cannot be good news for the struggling retail and food leisure operators.
Against the current round of staff cutbacks and re-organisation within the Valuation Office, paired with the catastrophe that is Check, Challenge, Appeal, it is a small consolation that the Chancellor committed to sufficient funding at the next spending review. With hundreds of thousands of appeals for the 2010 rating list still to be resolved and the floodgate that is waiting to open for 2017 disputes there needs to be some serious resource invested both in staff and IT.
With the rental valuation date for the 2021 revaluation being confirmed as 1st April 2019 – only a few days after formal Brexit it will be a very interesting property market to analyse.
