For years, working out a business rates bill in England started with one of two multipliers. From 1 April 2026 there are five. This is the single biggest reason bills moved in ways people did not expect this year.
How the sum works
Your bill starts as a simple multiplication:
Rateable value × multiplier = gross rates payable
Reliefs and transitional arrangements are applied after that. So the multiplier that applies to your property is doing a lot of work.
The five multipliers for 2026/27
| Multiplier | 2026/27 | Applies to |
|---|---|---|
| Small business | 43.2p | Rateable value of £50,999 or less |
| Standard | 48.0p | Rateable value of £51,000 or more, where no other multiplier applies |
| Small retail, hospitality and leisure | 38.2p | Qualifying retail, hospitality and leisure property below the small business threshold |
| Standard retail, hospitality and leisure | 43.0p | Qualifying retail, hospitality and leisure property above the small business threshold |
| High value | 50.8p | Rateable value of £500,000 or more |
A property assessed at £40,000 pays 43.2p in the pound. The same property at £60,000 pays 48.0p. A shop at £40,000 that qualifies as retail pays 38.2p.
The two lower rates for retail, hospitality and leisure
These are new and permanent, replacing the temporary relief schemes that had been rolled over year after year. They apply to qualifying retail, hospitality and leisure property - broadly shops, restaurants, pubs, cafés, hotels, gyms and similar premises open to the public.
Whether your property qualifies is worth confirming rather than assuming. The difference between 38.2p and 43.2p on a £45,000 assessment is around £2,250 a year, and the category your property sits in on the Valuation Office record is what drives it.
The £500,000 cliff edge
The high value multiplier is the one that catches people out, because it is not tiered. A property assessed at £500,000 pays 50.8p on the entire rateable value, not just the amount above the threshold.
Run the numbers:
- £499,000 at 48.0p = £239,520
- £500,000 at 50.8p = £254,000
An extra £1,000 of rateable value costs roughly £14,500 a year.
That is a strong reason to look hard at any assessment sitting just above the line. If a floor area is overstated by a few per cent, or ancillary space has been valued as prime, correcting it may not only reduce the rateable value - it may move the property back below the threshold and change the multiplier as well.
This matters far more in Guildford and London than it does in most of the country, simply because more property there is valued at that level.
Autumn Budget 2026: the £18,000 threshold
On 28 October 2026 the Chancellor announced that the Small Business Rate Relief threshold for retail, hospitality and leisure property will rise from £12,000 to £18,000 of rateable value, with a two-year real-terms freeze for those sectors above it. The multipliers above are unchanged for 2026/27; the new threshold is expected to apply from the next rates year once the Budget documents confirm the date and any taper. Our guide to the Budget announcement covers what it means for a property assessed near the line.
Transitional arrangements
If your rateable value rose sharply at the revaluation, transitional arrangements limit how fast the bill can catch up. That is why the figure on your bill may be lower than rateable value multiplied by the multiplier above.
It is a cushion, not a discount. The bill still steps up each year until it reaches the full amount, so a large increase you were expecting to feel next year is usually still coming.
Multipliers change every year
The figures above are for 2026/27 and are set annually. The rateable value underneath them, though, is fixed for the life of the list unless something changes at the property - or unless it is challenged.
Which is the point: you cannot do anything about the multiplier, but you can do something about the rateable value it is applied to.
Chartered Surveyor. Twelve years in business rates at Altus Group (now Ryan), four of them as a Director, and more than fifteen years of rating work across the South of England and London. RICS-regulated firm no. 897221.
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Get in touchThis article is general information about how business rates work in England, written for ratepayers. It is not advice on any particular property, and the rules change. If a decision turns on it, take advice on the facts of your own case.