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We do the accounts, VAT, payroll and planning for pubs, restaurants, cafés, hotels and B&Bs across Northern Ireland, from our office on Fenaghy Road in Ballymena.
See your monthly feeAccounts, tax, bookkeeping and VAT returns start from £149 + VAT a month, set by your turnover. Business Pulse starts from £375 + VAT a month.
The bill is the property's net annual value times the poundage: the regional rate of 30.79p plus your council's district rate. In England, a pub with a rateable value under £51,000 pays 38.2p in the pound.
As an example, a pub in Mid and East Antrim with a net annual value of £10,000 pays £7,170.75 before relief, and £5,736.60 after 20% Small Business Rate Relief.
Values still come from the 2023 revaluation. The Finance Minister paused the 2026 revaluation on 29 January 2026.
The County Court grants liquor licences under the Licensing (Northern Ireland) Order 1996. To be granted a new pub or off-licence licence, you give up an existing one to the court.
Pubs open from 11.30am to 11pm on weekdays and 12.30pm to 11pm on Sundays. A court order can add hours to 1am, and pubs and hotels can apply to open until 2am on up to 104 nights a year.
A licensed restaurant serves alcohol with a table meal and displays a notice of those conditions. Every licence runs out on 30 September 2027, and renewals go to the court by 9 August 2027.
The 2023 tips law and the tipping policy rules in the Employment Rights Act 2025 extend to England, Wales and Scotland only.
Since 6 April 2026 Statutory Sick Pay is paid from the first day of illness, at £123.25 a week or 80% of average weekly earnings, whichever is lower.
The three-step statutory procedure still applies: a written statement, a meeting, then an offer of appeal. A dismissal that skips it is automatically unfair.
With 11 or more employees working 16 hours or more a week you register with the Equality Commission within a month and send a return every year.
Northern Ireland has ten bank and public holidays a year, including St Patrick's Day and the Battle of the Boyne, against eight in England and Wales.
The UK rates apply: £12.71 an hour from age 21, £10.85 from 18 to 20 and £8.00 under 18 and for apprentices.
Offering tourist accommodation without a Tourism NI certificate is an offence, with a fine of up to £2,500 or up to six months in prison. Hotels, guest houses and B&Bs are inspected every four years.
Every food business displays its food hygiene rating at or near each customer entrance, and gives the rating when a customer asks in person or by phone. In England the display is voluntary.
VAT, corporation tax, income tax, National Insurance and alcohol duty are the same as in Great Britain.
Unit 13:62 Fenaghy Road, Ballymena, Co. Antrim, BT42 1FL. Clients near Ballymena can meet us at the office, and clients across Northern Ireland work with us by phone and video call.
No. The Employment (Allocation of Tips) Act 2023 extends to England, Wales and Scotland only. In April 2025 the Economy Minister announced a Good Jobs Employment Rights Bill that would require tips to be passed on to workers in full. We pay tips through payroll on the same basis for clients across the UK, and keep a written tipping policy at each site.
The Department of Finance has announced no hospitality relief for 2026/27, and England's lower hospitality multipliers do not apply. Small Business Rate Relief takes 50% off where the net annual value is £2,000 or less, 25% up to £5,000 and 20% up to £15,000. It runs to 31 March 2027.
To be granted a pub or off-licence licence you give up an existing one to the County Court, and the court will refuse it if the area already has enough. In November 2025 the Communities Minister decided to keep this surrender rule.
Yes, once you have 11 or more employees working 16 hours or more a week. You register within one month of reaching that number, and then send a monitoring return every year.
Send us your last accounts, a VAT return and a payroll run. We will show you what we would change and what it would cost each month.