To add a new Business to the Vicinity Directory, ensure you are on the ‘Businesses’ tab.

*If you need to find the property reference number please see here

We use this reference as all local authorities use this number when they send billing data. Vicinity uses this as it is the only reference number that stays the same so it helps to keep duplicate records out of the system and the number of levy-paying hereditaments correct.

If you enter a property reference that already exists within Vicinity you will be asked to resolve this conflict. By resolving the conflict, the system will automatically archive the previous business and create a new record see Managing an Occupancy Change

It is great to know that once you have entered the property reference the property details such as address and any rateable values are automatically copied to the new Business.

Note: You can add a business without a property reference number, but this makes it harder to keep the database free from duplicate records and will not be matched during the Data Updater process leading to multiple records per hereditament.

*If you are adding a Non BID member business please see this article instead - Adding Non-member Business Records

Before continuing, it is useful to add People associated with the Business for contacts and assign a voter or primary contact for the Business you are adding.

You can always come back to this though see Creating a Person Record

Once you have inputted as much data as possible you can save and close, or if you have multiple Businesses to add you can 'save and new'.

You can search our collection of help articles here 👉🏻 Vicinity Help Desk or we have a useful video of using the system basics here 👉🏻 Back to Basics