Bordars Superstore Limited
Your rateable value already qualifies for full Small Business Rate Relief, so your bill is £0 regardless of whether the valuation itself is on the high side. This assumes it's your only business property; relief is granted by your local council, not automatically.
Same use class and scheme, within about 1 km. The tall bar is you.
Zone A £/m² — the rate the Valuation Office applies to your frontage zone (Zone A) — the value of that zone divided by its area, not your whole rateable value divided by your whole floor area, so properties of different sizes can be compared like-for-like, before anything is applied to it: the multiplier, reliefs or your final bill. Source: VOAThe government body that sets every property's Rateable Value. From April 2026 the VOA is part of HMRC (see below), but 'VOA' is still the common name for the valuation side of the work. 2026 Rating ListThe public register listing every business property's Rateable Value. The current list is the '2026 list', based on rental values from 1 April 2024..
The Valuation Office’s floor area for this property is materially larger than the one on the Energy Performance Certificate lodged for the same address — and energy certificates are measured generously, so they normally read larger than the rating list, not smaller.
We’ve ruled out the usual innocent explanations for this one: there are no other floors a certificate could have missed, it covers the whole address rather than part of it, and it’s recent.
Your rateable value is driven by that area, so if the rating list is the record that’s wrong, your bill is too high. Correcting it is a Check — free, no surveyor needed, and unlike a Challenge it cannot be used to increase your rateable value. The full report shows both measurements, what the difference is worth on your bill, and how to file it.
Every shop the Valuation Office values on the same scheme as you — the comparison that actually decides your rate
| Comparable | Distance | Floor area | RV | Zone A £/m² | Match |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| same postcode | 41.9 m² | £10,500 | £320 | 39% | |
| same postcode | 43.9 m² | £10,750 | £320 | 40% | |
| same postcode | 52.4 m² | £13,750 | £320 | 48% | |
| same postcode | 58.6 m² | £11,750 | £320 | 54% | |
| 1.4 km | 24.1 m² | £6,000 | £305 | 22% | |
| 1.4 km | 58.9 m² | £15,750 | £305 | 54% | |
| 1.4 km | 117.2 m² | £11,000 | £305 | 93% | |
| 2.3 km | 31.2 m² | £8,200 | £320 | 29% | |
| Your property | — | 109 m² | £12,000 | £320 | — |
Parade Zone A £/m² ≈ £320/m². Your unit is assessed at £320/m². Distances are approximate and measured from your property.
Your Energy Performance Certificate records a smaller floor area than the Valuation Office has charged you on. Worth checking your own measurements against both — an overstated area is one of the most common valuation errors we find.
With a rateable value of £12,000, you likely qualify for Small Business Rate Relief — up to 100% off your bill if this is your only business property (under £12,000), tapering to nothing at £15,000. Relief isn't always applied automatically — check your bill and ask your council if it's missing. This is a discount on the bill, separate from whether your rateable value is right.
Your Zone A rate of £320/m² is the rate the Valuation Office applies right across the valuation scheme you sit in — 24 other shops on that same scheme carry exactly the same rate. Shops elsewhere nearby may be assessed lower, but the Valuation Office prices each scheme on its own trading position, so that is a difference between locations, not an error in your assessment. Challenging it would mean arguing the whole scheme's rate is wrong, which affects every shop on it and is a specialist surveyor's argument, not a comparables one. So: no grounds on the rate, and no fee. The floor-area and relief checks below don't depend on the rate and are where cases like yours are more often won.
Small Business Rate Relief already reduces this bill to nothing, so there is no saving to pursue. The full breakdown is still yours to read, and we’ll keep monitoring the property for free.
View full breakdownThis is an estimate, not a guaranteed saving. Business Rate Checker compares your property against similar ones in the official rating list to flag where your rateable value looks high. The figures shown — including any suggested rateable value, annual saving or backdated refund — are indicative and depend on the evidence the Valuation Office Agency (VOA, now part of HMRC) accepts. The actual outcome could be higher, lower, or nil, and in rare cases a review can leave a value unchanged or increased. Nothing here is a valuation, financial or legal advice; it's information to help you decide whether to look into your bill further.
Independent service — not endorsed by the VOA/HMRC. Business Rate Checker is an independent service. We use published rating-list data under licence, but the Valuation Office Agency (now part of HMRC) does not endorse, back, verify or take any responsibility for this site, our comparisons or our estimates. Official rateable values and any formal decisions come only from the VOA/HMRC.