Liverpool, in the UK’s northwest, is set to join the British destinations charging tourists a tax when they stay in one of the city’s hotels. The levy costs £2 per night (around €2.36 at the time of writing) and will be charged on check out and collected by hotels and all serviced overnight rooms.
The measure, to be applied from June 2025, was approved by hoteliers after a consultation with the Accommodation Business Improvement District (BID), a stakeholder group that comprises 83 members. Intended to raise a haul of £9.2m (over two years, around two-thirds of that will go into a subvention fund to boost the city’s visitor economy.
A “turbo charge” for the visitor economy
Bill Addy, CEO of the Liverpool BID Company, said the fee will “turbo charge Liverpool’s tourism and visitor economy, helping the city attract bigger events [and] bring people to the city. Other European destinations’ approaches to tourist charges had been part of the equation when putting the strategy together, Addy said.
In the UK, Manchester has also introduced a tourist tax, and Scotland has voted in favour of a fee that can be applied according to the country’s local authorities plans. Venice has been applying a tourist “access charge” to day trips in the city. However, authorities in England lack the powers to bring in fees without preparing a business case and going through special processes.
Addy predicts the Liverpool model will follow European examples and “translate overnight stays into major investment.” Meanwhile, Marcus Magee, the Chair of Liverpool’s Accommodation BID, hailed the plan as “a major step in enabling the hospitality sector to have a say and an influence in regards to the city’s decision-making around the visitor economy, which is crucial to the vibrancy and economy of the city.”
A warm welcome from the Beatles’ hometown
Liverpool City Councillor Harry Doyle, the cabinet member for culture and the visitor economy, said the creation of a visitor charge is “a great vote of confidence in the growth of our successful visitor economy. I want to thank all the businesses that participated in the ballot. Their positive support delivers a huge boost to Liverpool’s tourism sector and our major events programme, supporting jobs and investment to benefit local people, and showing how Liverpool continues to offer a warm welcome to visitors from around the world.”
Liverpool is a port destination, known for the River Mersey, its world-famous champion football club, and, perhaps most famously, as the Beatles’ hometown.
