Ipswich Borough Council and Ipswich Central have jointly announced that retail, leisure and hospitality businesses will be given longer to pay their BID levy this year.
Businesses in these categories were given an exemption from business rates charges for the forthcoming year in recent government announcements. The Council and the Ipswich BID have agreed to work together to lobby government to extend the exemption to BID levy. Until government make a decision, the BID levy money is still owed as the Regulations dictate. However, the Council and Ipswich Central have agreed that, in order to allow government the time required to reach a definitive decision on the matter, businesses in the retail, hospitality, and leisure sectors in Ipswich will not need to pay their levy until 30th June 2020.
On making the announcement, Terry Baxter, Chair of Ipswich Central, said: “I am very grateful to Ipswich Borough Council for working with us so quickly on this. In addition to relaxing the payment rules here in Ipswich, we are committed to working together to persuade government of the obvious benefits of mirroring the one-year business rates holiday for retail, leisure and hospitality businesses and to reimburse this for us. COVID-19 has dealt a huge blow to our members. Ipswich Central provides vital services which need to continue and will be even more crucial when this emergency is over and recovery begins.”
The Chief Executive of Ipswich Borough Council, Russell Williams commented: “The Council has written to all affected businesses and hopes that this position - agreed with Ipswich Central - will help provide some certainty to business. But, if business do have queries about payment of the BID levy they should email them to business.rates@ipswich.gov.uk.”
