Affordability really can be a worry.
Reading the following post with court summons for a small business owner in Weston-Super-Mare, and how she cannot really afford the BID levy bill, brings home the realities of how hard paying the BID tax can be for some businesses.
It’s a very easy non-consequential decision for the store managers of national and regional chains to say they’ll support BID, after all they personally won’t see even £1 leave their pocket. Then there are those independents that are fairing better than others who can afford and may happily pay the BID, fair enough. But then there will always be those that are working hard to break even, and just don’t need an extra type of business rates overhead in the form of BID levy coming out of their own pocket, for something they never wanted or voted for.
This applies so well to what the Taunton BID Steering Committe are attempting to do by trying to force in a private tax on all businesses, whether they want BID or not.
For this Weston example the £127.50 (her normal BID bill without summons cost etc) might not seem like much to some, but for this person like many others in BID areas throughout the UK, being forced to pay any amount in full once a year, for five years (if still in business of course) is worrying. The same is true in Taunton and as one small independent told us, given she doesn’t see how BID can benefit her business, she needs to be “selfish” for herself by not paying this overhead. We told her it’s not selfish to not want to spend money coming out of her own pocket, that’s commercial sense, but how sad she even felt this way. That’s an example of how Taunton BID is already making some people feel.
Some small shop owners in the Taunton BID area aren’t actually there to make huge amounts of money, for some it’s a lifestyle business and as one such owner told us, if she has any profit left at the end of the year she’ll simply look to pay herself something. So being made to pay a £300 tax bill in one instalment every year, for 5 years, is simply an unwelcome overhead, particularly as BID can’t demonstrate any return on investment. Let’s remember that for a £300 levy bill and depending on profit margins of a particular business, it’s likely a business needs to achieve additional sales of hundreds or even thousands of pounds, just pay the levy bill. When high street and town overheads are high enough as they are, and even Taunton is crying out for businesses to occupy units, why on earth do we want to discourage small independents like this from setting up, or even staying in town?
The problem is that most BID proposer’s in a very blinkered way undemocratically force BID’s on business communities, with most businesses in a BID area not actually voting for it. Taunton BID have said they see no downsides or risks to BID which is totally naive, but perhaps the BID proposers and their supporters who don’t have any worries about paying the private tax, should actually give some moral consideration to the affordability of others they are trying hard to force a new business rate on.
Let’s be a considerate town to all businesses Taunton, there’s just no need to force BID on businesses that don’t need it or can’t really afford it. Even businesses should show compassion and consideration for others.
