ON SEPTEMBER 30 businesses across the country will be given a helping hand or dealt a tough blow by the Government as new business rates assessments are published.

These will form the basis for rates collected by local councils from all businesses from next April. As a pre-cursor, the first results of work carried out for the 2010 Rating Revaluation have just been released. Overall the Government predicts that 60% of businesses’ rates will fall, and the figures suggest generally good news for the North West, where the total cost of business rates is predicted to drop by 1 or 2%.

However, as ever, the devil is likely to be in the detail. The published figures are general and individual properties, streets and towns will be affected differently.

One big concern is that the revaluation is based on property values at April 2008, which begs the question of whether assessments will be set artificially high because of the boom during Liverpool’s year as Capital of Culture. Liverpool has seen major changes in the past 18 months, which it will have been difficult to build into the 2010 rateable values.

As an example the opening of Liverpool One has had a major effect on the pattern of retailing, pedestrian flows and rents throughout the city centre. The Government has also begun a consultation period for transitional arrangements which limit the impact of large changes in rates bills. Businesses have until September 23 to comment on these.

Based on the published data, most businesses in the North West should argue for no transition, enabling the full effect of reduced bills to be felt immediately.

That said, there is a strong case for a limited scheme to protect those faced with the biggest rate increases.

We all have to wait until September before individual assessments are made available and each business finds out whether they are amongst the lucky many or the unfortunate few.

Only then will we know the extent to which the Valuation Office has taken account of Liverpool’s special circumstances and will businesses be able to accurately forecast the cost of their rates bills from April 2010 onwards.