ATM’s Court of Appeal Decision – November 2018

ATM’s Court of Appeal Decision – November 2018

The Court of Appeal has decided on the long awaited ATM cases – a copy of the full decision can be read here  – Decision 

Cardtronics and the supermarkets (Sainsbury’s, Tesco and The Co-Operative) brought the case against the Valuation Office who had added a number of ATM units to the 2010 rating list and the decision now means that ATM’s located both inside and outside of stores should not be assessed separately where there is ‘paramount control’ by the occupier of the store/bank so our understanding thus far is that for the likes of the supermarkets and banks these would not be rated but there are some ‘grey areas’ that will need to be considered.

This decision does not mean that all ATM’s as we understand it will now be removed from the rating list, only those where it can be shown that there is ‘paramount control’ by the store/bank and standalone machines should still be rated.

We await to see whether the Valuation Office will appeal this decision and will provide a further update on this. But, important to note that adequate provisions will need to be made on rates retention for forecasting purposes on losses and WHE can help with this so please get in contact with one of the team.