RICHMONDSHIRE District Council is deferring the collection of business rates for the month of April to help businesses through a difficult period.

No Direct Debit payments will be requested in April and ratepayers paying by other means will not be required to pay their April instalment on April 1.

However the month's instalment will still be needed to be paid later in the financial year- unless businesses are issued with a revised bill.

The council is currently working on issuing revised business rate bills to all those businesses that will be entitled to 100% retail discount.

These bills are scheduled to be posted next week March 23.

For further information please contact 01748 829100.