This section aims to provide comprehensive information about business rates in the City of London.
Business rates
Business rates (non-domestic rates) are collected by billing authorities on behalf of central Government and paid into a central pool. They are subsequently re-distributed to billing authorities and major participating authorities.
The City of London’s share of re-distributed rate income, together with income from its council tax payers, revenue support grant provided by the government and certain other sums, is used to pay for the services provided by the Council and other local authorities in your area.
Because of its special circumstances - notably its very small resident population and high daytime population - the City of London can set its own rate and retain part of the proceeds to help pay for the services it provides. It may set this rate, subject to certain constraints, at a higher or lower level than the rate that applies outside the City of London. The amount it must pay into the central pool is reduced by the amount that the government believes it is reasonable for it to retain. These arrangements ensure that City of London ratepayers and council tax payers each bear an appropriate share of the costs of providing the services that benefit them.
Local Government funding is changing and under the business rates retention arrangements, introduced from 1 April 2013, local authorities will keep a proportion of business rates raised. However, due to the amount of rates collected by the City, it will pay a tariff to central Government to be redistributed to local government. As a result, the amount retained will be quite small compared with the amount collected. The City will also keep the sum resulting from the premium of 0.4p in the £, which has been levied to further enhance the Police Service, security, resilience and contingency planning in the City.
For further information, please use the links on the left to navigate around and, if you are unable to find the information you require, refer to the contacts page.
Further information
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News
- How to pay
You can pay your business rates by monthly instalments or quarterly, half-yearly or annually
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News
- How your bill is calculated
Find out which factors are considered when calculating your payments