One of the first things to look into when applying for a licence to see alcohol is how much a premises licence application costs.
The main things you’ll need to pay for are the application fee, a range of hidden extras and, if you decide against making the application yourself, professional fees payable to a licensing lawyer or consultant.
Application fee
When you send off your application, you’ll also need to send payment for the Premises Licence fee. How much you will need to pay will depend on the non-domestic rateable value of your premises, whether the premises are used ‘exclusively or primarily for the supply of alcohol for consumption on the premises’ and whether you host any events with more than 5,000 attendees at at time.
The Department for Culture, Media and Sport have published the main fee levels here.
Those hidden extras
On top of the Premises Licence fees payable to the council, there are various other things you’ll find yourself forking out for:
Personal Licence
It’s fine for an application to go off without a Personal Licence holder named as the Designated Premises Supervisor. However, until a Personal Licence holder has been named on the licence you won’t be able to make any sales of alcohol.
Personal Licences don’t cost as much as Premises Licences, but they’re certainly not free. Here’s our article answering the question ‘How much does a Personal Licence cost?’
Plans
You’ll need to submit plans of the premises to be licensed along with your application. Although there are no real requirements for how professionally produced these need to be, bear in mind that the plans need to match to the reality of the premises.
Photocopying
The application and supporting documents need to be sent to each of the responsible authorities – that’s a lot of paper.
Postage
You’ll want to send the application by special delivery so you have a send receipt. The cost of that will rack up though, so you might even consider hand delivering or, if you’re in a city, paying a bike courier to make the deliveries.
Your time
Time is money, especially when you’re running a business. Which leads us nicely on to…
Need some licensing advice?
You might want to consider speaking to a licensing lawyer or consultant. Their fees will vary depending on the requirements and will almost certainly be higher if representations are likely to be received.
However, the peace of mind you get from a professional dealing with the job is valuable.
