The smallest businesses in a BID area are excluded from having a say on their trading environment.

A BID is a private club, and if you don’t pay, you don’t get a say! Often businesses below a certain Ratable Value will be exempt the levy, meaning they don’t get a ballot vote or have to pay the levy.

At first glance this might seem a good result for small independent traders within a BID area. But it also means that in the future they will have no say in projects or initiatives within their own business district, and are not allowed to have an executive role in the BID company.

Consequently, besides not being able to have such a say, with no real say this can result in BID projects that are ultimately detrimental to these smaller businesses, for example street market selling outside their doors. There are some very clever and creative small business owners that could possibly bring value to developing and leading BID ideas, or objecting to others as a Director, that could be excluded unless they are a levy payer.

Here’s what one town BID proposers (Taunton) said about small businesses with an RV under £5,000, in which they make it clear they only want to deal with with “eligible businesses” i.e. those paying to be in the club:

“The cost of collecting the levy from these smaller businesses outweighs the income generated from them. It also means that the number of businesses is reduced, meaning that we can communicate with eligible businesses more effectively.”

BID proposers will say that all businesses within their area are important to them to develop the district, but fact is it’s a private members only tax club.