High Maintenance

Regardless of the type of business functioning under your current liquor license registration, (be it a restaurant, hotel, guest house or liquor store), to ensure that you don’t find yourself in the predicament of your registration being removed and having to re-apply, your current registration needs to be maintained.  It’s quite similar to maintaining any other aspect of your business and due care should be taken in the following scenarios:

 

Sale of a licensed business:

Should the business be sold, the current registration needs to be transferred to the new owner, and more importantly the registration should be maintained by annually renewing the license, whilst the transfer application is being considered by the Board. As soon as the application for transfer is lodged, new owners may carry on with business as before.

 

Change in management:

Should a new manager be appointed – who will be managing the business in so far as the license is concerned – this needs to be brought to the Liquor Board’s attention and an application needs to be lodged for approval by the Board.

 

Deregistration of a company:

For purposes of sustaining the registration and enabling the owner to buy stock, the license needs to be registered in the name of a member, as elected by the directors, or the sole director of the deregistered company.

 

Structural alterations to the premises:

If the existing area is expanded, changed/added to – as with any permits applied for beforehand to commence with any changes to the premises, so also the Liquor Board should be approached by lodging the relevant application to permit material changes to the licensed premises.

 

Variation of the conditions of the registration:

All businesses go through growths and changes. If it happens that a license registration was granted under the conditions of a restaurant and it appears later on that the business best functions as a tavern, the conditions of the registration can be changed.  The relevant application for changes of this nature needs to be lodged for consideration and approval by the Liquor Board.

 

Annual renewal of licenses:

Each Province has its own timeframes and fees in respect of annual renewals (usually at the end of each year). The non-payment of renewal fees are seen as negligence in the maintenance of the registration and most Liquor Boards will not consider condonation for late payment of renewal fees.

For the Free State Province annual renewals start in December of every year and all renewal fees need to be paid on/before (before is highly recommended) the end of February of the following year (the relevant renewal year).

 

There are many more instances where it is necessary to maintain your license by way of notifying the Board of any changes to be made, be it materially or conditionally.  Contact us today for any queries on the influence intended changes to your business might have on your liquor license registration.

 

Cheers!