The BCC is calling on the Treasury to rethink its plans for business rates as anxiety about changes to the system in April reaches record levels.

In the BCC’s Quarterly Economic Survey (QES) Q4 2025, a third of firms (34%) said they are worried about business rates. This is the highest level since the BCC started asking the question in the Q2 QES of 2017.

Companies cite cost pressure from business rates as a key reason for increasing prices and delaying expansion of their premises.

While the Government has indicated it is considering a rethink on business rates for pubs, BCC research shows the disquiet being felt goes much wider.

The hospitality, manufacturing and logistics sector face the highest levels of concern, but business size is also a factor, with anxiety over rates highest for firms with 10 to 49 employees (43%).

This follows BCC data from February 2024 which found that 27% of surveyed businesses said they had scaled back or cancelled plans to upgrade or open premises as a direct result of business rates costs.

In a BCC survey from February 2025, 23% of respondents said that business rates had a direct impact on their prices.

Kate Shoesmith, Director of Policy and Insights at the BCC, said:

“The Chancellor recognised in the Autumn Budget that the current system for business rates is broken and holding back growth. But it is becoming increasingly clear that the changes she set out are not balanced and leave some sectors over-exposed.

“While news of a carve out for pubs is welcome, there are many other smaller hospitality companies facing an existential threat. Meanwhile at the other end of the scale, airports and hotel chains are expected to pay millions more.

“The first step in addressing this must be an uplift in the level of transitional relief to offset the huge upswing many firms are facing in their rateable values come April.

“The Government must then deliver the more ambitious root and branch reform of the whole system promised in their manifesto.

“The last four years of Brexit, Covid, rising energy bills, wars and other geopolitical crises have pushed costs to record highs and these show no signs of waning.

“With new employment legislation coming down the tracks, a further inflation busting rise in the minimum wage and continuing global headwinds, the government must ease the burden.

“To fix business rates it should move to annual revaluations, to remove the steep jumps in bills caused by longer gaps, and it must adopt a single flat rate multiplier of 40p.

“These changes would provide much greater transparency, simplicity and fairness than the current complex, rigid system.”