Scottish shops report 10% decline in business rates
Last month, business rate bills for stores in Aberdeen decreased by 19% while increasing in Shetland
Scottish shops have seen a 10% drop in business rate bills, following a revaluation from the beginning of last month.
The new Scottish Government figures reflect changing rental values, which have been updated by council assessors for the first time in six years, forming the basis for levying £3.86bn in tax
The report also stated that the largest proportional decreases were for shops with rateable values between £100,000 and £1m.Their retail bills were down 13%.
Meanwhile, the average rateable value of public houses and restaurants decreased by 1.22%, leading to a decrease in gross bills of 4.56%, with smaller premises gaining more of a cut and larger ones seeing an increase in their bills.
Additionally, the overall gross bill in 2023 – 2024 for hotels class decreased by 0.74%.
However, industrial premises (such as stores, workshops, and warehouses) reported an increase of rateable value of 9.97%, and in gross bills of 8.01%.
The report also highlighted that there are wide variations across the country.
Rateable values of shops decreased most in Aberdeen City (18.23%, with gross bills decreasing by 19.12%). The largest increase was in the Shetland Islands, where the average rateable value of shops increased by 16.88%, and the gross bills increased by 6.56%.