Success Stories
Below we have outlined a few cases where we have been able to save our clients substantial amounts of money.
- Our client occupies a large office building on a major Cambridge business park. When we were able to convince the VO to look at his evidence of value from a different angle, he agreed that this evidence was flawed. Using our evidence produced a reduction in RV of £35,000.
We had a similar situation in Buckinghamshire, where the reduction achieved meant a saving of more than £1.5 million for our client! - A client suddenly found himself liable for rates on an inherited empty store many miles from home. He had never considered the issue until full rates were reintroduced on vacant property in April 2008. He faced a bill he couldn’t afford to pay.
We asked the Valuation Office to treat this with urgency, negotiated a 60% reduction in the Rateable Value, & introduced our client to Small Business Rates Relief.
As a result, his bill reduced from a little over £6,000 to less than £1,300, making it possible for him to keep the building, which has real sentimental value.
We have helped several clients to reduce substantial bills on vacant industrial buildings. - In Swindon, our client’s substantial headquarters building had an unconventional layout. By spending a long time measuring it properly, we established that the VO had made several mistakes. He agreed to use our survey, & we obtained a reduction in RV of £85,000 as a result. The rate bill is now £37,000 lower each year.
It is not uncommon for assessments to be based on the wrong “facts”, and we make sure we get the right ones. - The recent negotiation of a 26% reduction in the RV of a timber mill in Cheshire will save our client almost £190,000. As part of our investigations, we discovered that one large building in the assessment was occupied by someone else, & already rated separately.
We have had other cases where buildings valued have never existed, but only appeared on a plan as a future project. - A client was paying rates on a large industrial building in Hertfordshire where the operation was being wound down. As a result the property was being vacated over a period of time. We were able to provide evidence that proved that a large section of the building had been empty for many months and as a result were successful in obtaining a substantial refund of rates that would have otherwise remained in the local council's coffers!
- For a major manufacturing client, we have recently passed the £1,000,000 mark for savings achieved under the 2005 Rating List.
- A developer client had all rates paid returned, with interest, when we persuaded the Valuation Officer that the building in question was incapable of occupation, & the assessment was deleted.
- We have, for some years, argued successfully that a client’s factory is an agricultural building, and therefore not liable to be rated.
CASE STUDIES
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