Choose your company closure route
To close your pub or bar limited company, first check whether it can pay every bill, including the cost of leaving the premises and paying staff. If it can settle its debts, you can consider strike-off once it meets the application conditions. A solvent company can also use members’ voluntary liquidation; ask your accountant and an insolvency practitioner whether that suits your remaining assets.
If the company cannot pay its debts, speak to an authorised insolvency practitioner about an insolvent closure, including creditors’ voluntary liquidation. Your priority shifts towards creditors when the company is insolvent.
Plan the licence and premises arrangements before starting formal liquidation or dissolving the company. Then deal with staff, trading agreements and stock before making the company application. The licence rules below cover England and Wales; Scotland and Northern Ireland have different systems, explained separately.
Arrange the premises licence before company closure
Check who holds the licence: it may be your company, you personally or another business. In England and Wales, a company-held premises licence lapses when the company is dissolved, enters liquidation, has an administrator or administrative receiver appointed, or has its directors’ voluntary arrangement approved. Liquidation includes a solvent liquidation. Struggling to pay bills alone is not one of these licence-lapse triggers. If another operator will continue, ask the council about transfer before the relevant event.
If the licence has already lapsed, contact the licensing team immediately. A qualifying transfer application can reinstate it if it seeks immediate effect and is received within 28 days of the lapse, subject to the statutory conditions and no active interim authority notice. Only one such application is allowed; withdrawal or rejection makes the licence lapse again. For company insolvency, a person with a prescribed interest in the premises or the former holder’s insolvency practitioner may instead give an interim authority notice within 28 days, but this route does not cover dissolution. Ask the council whether you must send copies to the police and Home Office or whether its electronic service handles them. Interim authority normally lasts no more than three months unless a qualifying transfer application is made. Ask the council to confirm the route and copies before relying on either option.
If you are the designated premises supervisor and want to step down, give notice to the council. Unless you also hold the premises licence, within 48 hours give the holder a copy and a direction to send the licence or relevant part, or reasons why it cannot be supplied, to the council within 14 days of receiving the direction. If you are also the holder, supply the licence or part, or the reasons, with your own notice. Do not assume leaving the company removes you as DPS.
Use the right licensing system in Scotland or Northern Ireland
In Scotland, speak to your Licensing Board about transfer before company closure. Scotland uses a premises manager with its own notification and replacement rules. Certain event-based transfers have a 28-day application window, but eligibility depends on the event and applicant. Get advice before permanently stopping alcohol sales: ceasing to use the premises for alcohol sales is itself a Scottish licence-end trigger. Do not assume the transfer window preserves a licence after that event.
In Northern Ireland, liquor-licence transfers go through the magistrates’ court. Take licensing advice before stopping trading: discontinuing the licensed business can prevent a transfer. The England and Wales reinstatement and interim-authority rules above do not apply across the UK.
Agree the lease and check personal guarantees
Get the lease and every guarantee out before agreeing your closure date. In England and Wales, check whether you can use a break clause and meet its notice and other conditions, negotiate a documented surrender, or obtain consent to assign the lease. Stopping trading does not itself end the rent commitment. Take advice on the lease in Scotland or Northern Ireland rather than applying England and Wales property rules.
If you have guaranteed rent, a loan or a supplier account personally, the creditor may claim against you if the company fails to pay. Ask for written confirmation of any agreed release; do not treat company closure as a release.
Agree the brewery, beer supply and equipment arrangements
Review the brewery tie, beer-supply agreement, loans and hired-equipment contracts together. Ask each provider to confirm the final delivery date, notice, any early-exit charge, outstanding balance and arrangements for returning stock, kegs or equipment. Record who owns the cellar equipment, dispensers, glasswasher and machines before agreeing any sale. Read your own terms and agree changes in writing: these are practical steps, not a universal right to cancel contracts or keep hired equipment.
Deal with gaming machines and music licences
In England, Wales and Scotland, a qualifying alcohol licence for sales on the premises can carry automatic entitlement to one or two Category C or Category D gaming machines. The licence holder must send written notification and the prescribed fee to the licensing authority and comply with the relevant code of practice on machine location and operation. This entitlement ends if the alcohol premises licence ends or you stop holding it. A transfer to another holder does not carry your entitlement over: the incoming holder must make its own notification and pay the fee.
For more than two Category C or Category D machines, use the separate licensed-premises gaming-machine permit route. A permit replaces the automatic entitlement; you cannot add the two allowances together. A permit depends on the premises keeping an alcohol licence and the permit holder continuing to hold it. If the alcohol licence transfers, apply separately for the gaming permit transfer; the permit does not move automatically. For a permanent closure, ask the licensing authority about surrender and arrange collection with the machine provider. Northern Ireland has separate gambling rules, so confirm the local permission and return arrangements there.
Write to PPL PRS about closing and ask it to confirm your licence end date and final charges. Its closure guidance requires written notice at least one month before the end of the current licence year for termination at that year-end. Do not assume your last trading day automatically cancels TheMusicLicence or produces a refund. If another operator takes over, contact PPL PRS to update the ownership and licence arrangements.
Plan staff pay and the last tips payment
In England, Wales and Scotland, consult employees before redundancies and budget for final wages, notice, accrued untaken statutory holiday and redundancy pay for qualifying employees. Statutory redundancy pay normally requires at least two years’ employment. Notice can be longer under the contract; statutory notice starts at one week after a month’s service and rises with service to a maximum of 12 weeks. If you propose 20 or more redundancies at one establishment within 90 days, collective consultation rules apply. If a buyer will carry on the pub or bar, get advice on TUPE before assuming staff should be dismissed.
For employer-controlled qualifying tips in England, Wales and Scotland, make the final fair allocation and payment by the end of the month after the customer paid the tip. You cannot use these tips to cover the company’s closure bills; limited deductions such as Income Tax remain possible. Keep the required tipping records for three years from the tip payment date. In Northern Ireland, check your staff’s notice, redundancy, holiday and tips position with the Labour Relations Agency before setting leaving dates.
Agree stock disposal and supplier balances
Count the alcohol stock and confirm what the company owns before arranging returns or sales. Agree supplier returns and any credit in writing. In England and Wales, continue selling to the public only with the right alcohol authorisation and within its conditions. Before arranging a sale to another pub or business for resale, ask HMRC whether Alcohol Wholesaler Registration Scheme approval is needed: the incidental-sales exception is limited, so do not assume a planned stock clearance qualifies. Ordinary sales of the pub’s trading stock affect when you can apply for strike-off.
Apply for strike-off when the company is eligible
Before applying, the company must have had three months without trading, ordinary trading-stock sales or a name change. Paying old trading debts alone does not count as trading. The law also allows activities needed to decide on or make the application, conclude the company’s affairs or comply with statutory requirements. Those exceptions do not turn an ordinary stock sale into exempt closing activity. A recent last sale can mean waiting until eligible; it does not automatically mean liquidation is required.
Relevant restructuring or insolvency proceedings can also prevent an application. These include court compromises or restructuring plans not finally concluded, a proposed or unfinished company voluntary arrangement, administration or its relevant interim moratorium, winding up or an unresolved winding-up petition, a receiver or manager, or a judicial factor administering the company’s estate. Take insolvency advice if any of these apply; strike-off is not a way to leave creditors unpaid.
Finish the staff, landlord and supplier balances, final accounts and Company Tax Return, and pay outstanding tax before closing the company. Deal with company assets and expected refunds before dissolution: property and money left in the company pass to the Crown. Keep the paperwork showing the lease, licence, contract and stock arrangements so you can demonstrate what was settled.
A majority of directors must sign the strike-off application. The Companies House fee is £13 online or £18 on paper. Within seven days of applying, send a copy to members, creditors including contingent or prospective creditors, employees, employee-pension managers or trustees, and directors who did not sign. Include landlords, staff, voucher holders, HMRC, breweries or suppliers where the company owes them money. People who become affected in these statutory categories while the application remains pending must also receive a copy within seven days of becoming affected.
The three-month restriction is about eligibility to apply, not a promise that the company has dissolved. Companies House publishes the proposed strike-off in The Gazette; if there are no objections, the notice period is at least two months before strike-off. The second Gazette notice confirms dissolution. If circumstances change during the application, such as restarting trading or entering relevant insolvency proceedings, withdraw it when the legal withdrawal rules require. Get advice before selling further company property while an application is pending: the asset-disposal exceptions differ before and after filing.