All licensees should have received their annual licence fee notices from the licensing authority by now. If you have not received a notice yet, you should follow up with the licensing authority. Licensees are responsible for paying their annual licence and permit fees on time, before 1 January 2019 (even if no notice is received from the licensing authority). Failure to pay the annual fees on time may result in fines being issued, suspension or even cancellation of licences or permits.
As reported previously in The Hospitality Messenger, the licensing authority has issued a blanket approval for most (but not all) sellers of packaged liquor to trade additional hours on 23 and 30 December 2018. On these dates:
Some restrictions apply to some licensees in some locations so all licensees should double check.
Otherwise, Christmas Day and New Year’s Eve/Day trading hours are generally as follows (unless a licence specifically states differently).
For licensees and hospitality operators, the festive period is a celebration of busy trading.
It is easy to get caught up and forget some of the legal obligations and responsibilities, so we have created the following brief checklist of the key things that tend to be overlooked:
Read our top 10 checklist blog post from earlier this month here and generally ensure compliance with conditions endorsed on a licence or ETP.
...Crowd controllers must be authorised in writing to remove people from licensed premises. Download the licensing authority’s authorisation form here.
In 2016 the Liquor Commission, by majority, refused Woolworths’ application to convert the Peninsula Tavern bottleshop into a Dan Murphy’s.
In 2017, following an appeal by Woolworths, the Supreme Court ruled that the majority of the Liquor Commission was in error and ordered the matter be re-heard by the Commission.
In April 2018 the Commission re-heard the matter and handed down another majority decision
which again refused the application. You can access the majority and minority decisions here.
...The Director of Liquor Licensing is conducting a review of special facility “catering” licences. Holders of such licences have received letters inviting submissions as to why certain conditions should not be endorsed on their licences.