Licensing fees

Application fees

Currently, the fees for applications made under the Licensing Act 2003 are set by Central Government. The fees are set out in the Licensing Act 2003 (Fees) Regulations 2005. For premises licences and club premises certificates, the application fees are set on a sliding scale based on the rateable value of the premises. You can check the current rateable value of your premises at the Valuation Office Agency (VOA) website.

If your rateable value changes, you must inform the City of London licensing team to ensure that you are paying the correct fee. If any inaccuracies come to light which result in a difference in the fee payable, the licensing authority will pursue payment of any additional fee or refund any overpayment, whichever the case may be.

For other applications such as personal licences or temporary event notices, the fee is set by the application type.

Annual fees

Once a licence or certificate has been granted, the licence or certificate holder must pay to the licensing authority an annual fee for the continuation of the licence. The fee becomes due and is payable each year on the anniversary of the date of the grant of the premises licence or club premises certificate.

If a licence or certificate holder fails to pay the annual fee on the due date, the licensing authority must suspend the licence, unless the payment was not made because of an administrative error or because the holder disputed liability of the fee before or at the due date. In such circumstances, there is a grace period of 21 days to resolve the dispute or error, after which time the licensing authority must suspend the licence.

A licence or certificate that has been suspended does not have effect to authorise licensable activities. The licence can only be reinstated when the outstanding fee has been paid.

Licensees should therefore ensure that they are familiar with their licence fee due dates and ensure that full payment is made to the licensing authority before or on the due date.