Our 73,000 Business And Commercial Property Owners Must Do Their Sums

Over 73,000 business and commercial properties in Northern Ireland should now be taking a careful note of how the rateable value (net annual value) of their premises has been assessed as of April 2013 and how this will convert into the annual rates bill which will be payable from April 2015.

In principle, revaluation is about sharing the burden of the total rates bill between different businesses, not about the total bill. Provided the assessed new NAV is fair, then businesses should focus on the details of the overall rate poundage.

Only when the two parts are combined can a business see whether the outcome of revaluation will lead to a higher or lower rates bill. The work of the revaluation team shows that in the years since the 2003 revaluation the Northern Ireland overall NAV has risen by 8%.

In itself, an increase of 8% is modest, compared to earlier decades.

Property rentals did rise sharply in the early years of this century.

Total NAV in each of the 11 new local government council areas increased between 2003 and 2015.

Proportionately, the largest gains were in Newry Mourne and Down (up 16%), Armagh Banbridge & Craigavon (up 15%) and Fermanagh Omagh (up 12%). The smallest increases were in East Antrim (up 2%) and Belfast (up 4.6%).

Source: belfasttelegraph.co.uk