We didn’t raise our hire charges at all during the COVID-19 pandemic, to help our hirers through those difficult times. However recent increases in energy and other costs meant we had to raise charges from 1 April this year by an average of around 15% (roughly equivalent to the average inflation rate over the last three years), after holding them since 1 April 2020.
The Management Committee have now agreed that we will not be making any change to hire charges until at least 1 April 2024.
We also simplified our main rates into two categories from 1 April:
- General Hirer Rate (Personal, Not For Profit, Small Community Business)
- Commercial Hirer Rate (Business & Public Sector)
Details of the new categories and rates are in this Hire Charges & Payment document: View/Download/Print. Note: We’ve defined a Small Community Business as one with an expected annual turnover under the amount where you’d normally have to register for VAT – so currently under £85000.