The Municipal Association of South Carolina’s Local Revenue Services offered business license officials 10 opportunities this summer to attend in-person training sessions throughout the state to learn more about the Local Business License Renewal Center. The trainings prepared current users and new users to operate the online system.
The sessions involved many hours explaining the system and helping staff, but our staff really enjoyed spending one-on-one time with business licensing staff all over the state. They brought us great questions and they have learned a tremendous amount about how to make the Renewal Center work smoothly since we first began testing the software years ago.
Officials join the Renewal Center training for the Berkeley-Charleston-Dorchester Council of Governments at Hanahan City Hall on August 18.
Never heard of the Renewal Center?
In recent years, the Municipal Association developed a statewide online portal for business license renewals. Act 176, the SC Business License Tax Standardization Act, which passed in 2020, requires that this system to be hosted by the SC Revenue and Fiscal Affairs Office. Municipalities and counties that levy a business license tax must offer the Renewal Center for businesses to use to pay their tax. For these jurisdictions, using this free software requires that they adopt a number of standard business license practices which are also required by Act 176.
What do the Renewal Center requirements mean for staff?
While Act 176 requires municipalities and counties to use the Renewal Center, it does not require that businesses use it. They still have the option to renew by mail, phone or in person.
If the business chooses to renew its business license using the online portal, the city, town or county must accept renewal applications through it. They cannot require the business to apply for a license another way if it chooses to renew its license through the Renewal Center. Any city, town or county that is not accepting renewals and payments through the online system is not following state law.
What does the Renewal Center mean for city and town councils?
Councilmembers should know that Act 176 standardized business license practices across the state. This makes it much easier for businesses operating in multiple jurisdictions to do business around the state, since now they have only one renewal deadline and one place to handle them.
One of the standardization requirements of Act 176 is that local jurisdictions update the class schedules they use for business license tax calculations every two years. The Municipal Association creates this update, which then receives approval from the SC Revenue and Fiscal Affairs Office, and must be passed by ordinance by each municipal or county council. To ensure compliance with Act 176, the Association recommends that councils pass its model business license ordinance, which includes the current class schedule as an appendix.
What does the Renewal Center mean for businesses?
The Local Business License Tax Renewal Center means that there is now one central location to renew and pay all local business license taxes, but it’s important to remember this is for renewals only — businesses cannot use it to establish new business licenses. When applying for new licenses, businesses need to go directly to the licensing jurisdictions. The Association created a message for cities and towns to use when explaining to businesses the key points of Act 176 and its effects.
More resources
- The Association’s website has a page that gathers together information about the Local Business License Renewal Center.
- The Renewal Center link for businesses to use is https://www.localblrenewal.com.
- The Renewal Center link for taxing jurisdictions to use when maintaining their accounts is https://jurisdiction.localblrenewal.com.
- Podcast — Local Business License Renewal Center Update: This episode features Local Revenue Services staff talking about what has happened in the first round of business license renewals since Act 176 became law, and what municipalities need to know about using the Renewal Center in 2023.
- Podcast – Local Business License Renewal Center Basics: This episode explains how the Renewal Center works and how to set up accounts.