As featured in the February edition of QHA Review Magazine
With the new year underway, now is a great time to review the trading hours for your hotel. As you know, your licensed venue is subject to specific trading hours under the Liquor Act 1992 (Qld) and regulated by the Office of Liquor and Gaming Regulation (OLGR). Depending on your needs, extensions to trading hours can be sought on either a temporary (one-off) or permanent (ongoing) basis. In this article, we will be specifically discussing permanent (ongoing) extended trading hours.
Permanent (Ongoing) Extended Trading Hours
The OLGR may approve your venue for extended liquor trading hours between 12am to 2am where it is located outside of a safe night precinct, and 12am to 3am for venues located within a safe night precinct. Separately, the gaming operations at your venue may be approved for maximum trading hours up to two hours after the liquor operation ceases.
Alternatively, if you are planning any early morning functions, you may seek approval from the OLGR to permanently extend the trading hours of your venue pre-10am – however, this is not commonly approved on a permanent basis for Commercial Hotels, other than for the operation of any on-site or detached bottleshop. Any trading pre-10am is subject to specific requirements and payment of additional annual licence fees.
Considerations
When seeking approval for extended trading hours, you should ensure that any town planning approvals for your hotel support the proposed extended trading hours or that you will seek the necessary town planning approvals prior to submitting your application – please note the OLGR will confer with your local council as part of your application.
You should also consider whether (this list is not exhaustive):
- There is a demonstrated community need for the extended trading hours (examples of this include trading volume/number of patrons at or near closing, requests from patrons or members of the community to extend hours, demand for gaming, location, increases in population etc.);
- There will be musical entertainment during the extended hours as this will result in the need for an acoustic report and conditions being imposed on your licence (or the varying of existing conditions); and
- There are special circumstances which would support an application requesting advertising requirements be waived – if there are not, and the application must be advertised, the OLGR may receive objections from the local community.
In our view, objections are more likely to be received when applications are seeking extended trading hours seven days a week or trading hours that are drastically different from other local venues. If there are valid objections received, the OLGR may elect to hold an objectors’ conference for the matters raised to be discussed. This conference may result in agreements being made with objectors, however, the decision on the application will rest with the OLGR.
Finally, you should note that if the application is approved, a valid objector may appeal the OLGR’s decision to the Queensland Civil and Administrative Tribunal within 28 days of the date of the letter advising the decision.
Benefits of Extended Trading Hours
There may be various benefits for your business in obtaining approval for extended trading hours, depending on the unique circumstances of your operations. Permanent extended trading hours can separately provide your business with more flexibility to service the demand from patrons, in turn contributing towards the revenue of your business. It may also allow your venue to have a competitive advantage and cater to a more diverse market, including shift workers and international tourists.
If you are considering extending your licensed trading hours to take advantage of increased business and/or functions, and you require assistance with the application process, then please feel free to contact me on 07 3224 0230.
