Flow monitoring in a tied pub: what the meter can and can't prove, what pubcos charge, and the stock records that answer a buying-out letter

If your pub company has a flow meter on your lines, the Pubs Code says it can't charge you, fine you or take action against you on a meter reading alone. Regulation 51 needs "additional evidence in connection with the purchase and stock of alcohol" at the pub. That cuts both ways. Stock records are the evidence a pubco will reach for, and they're also your best answer. One big pubco publishes its charges: £190 a barrel for draught it says was bought outside the tie (about 66p a pint), £10 a case for packaged, and a £300 plus VAT admin fee each time. And its meters are only recalibrated for a claim if they're out by more than 1.75% on keg or 3.5% on cask. On a pub pouring 1,000 keg pints a week, 1.75% is 17 pints a week that can sit inside the tolerance.

I'm a tied tenant. The tie is the deal: you buy your beer from the pub company and it supplies the pub. Flow monitoring is how a lot of pubcos check the deal's being kept. A meter on each line counts what goes through it, and the pubco compares that against what it delivered. If more beer comes out of the taps than went in through the cellar door, someone wants to know why.

Most licensees I know have never seen their own meter data, couldn't tell you what tolerance the meters run to, and first think about any of it when a letter turns up. This guide is the stuff I'd want to know before that letter, not after.

What the law says

The Pubs Code covers tenants of the big pub companies in England and Wales. Regulation 51 is short. A pub-owning business must not subject a tied tenant to any detriment, or impose any liability, as a result of a reading from a flow monitoring device without additional evidence about the purchase and stock of alcohol at the pub.

A flow monitoring device, for the Code, is one that's at the pub at the pubco's direction to measure how much alcohol is being sold, so it can check you aren't selling outside the terms of your agreement. The Pubs Code Adjudicator's own summary puts it plainly: flow monitoring devices can't be used in isolation to monitor sales and stock.

Two things follow. First, a meter reading on its own isn't enough for a charge. Second, "additional evidence about purchase and stock" is exactly what a stocktake, a delivery file and a cellar count are. Whoever has the better records is in the stronger position. It shouldn't be the pubco by default.

Scotland has its own pubs code with its own rules. Everything here is the England and Wales Code.

What a pubco says it does when the numbers don't match

Star Pubs publishes its process in its "Working with Star" guide, which makes it a useful example of what one large pubco actually does. I'm using it because it's public, not because Star is better or worse than anyone else. Your own agreement and your own pubco's guide are what count for you, so ask your BDM for theirs in writing.

Star's guide says the meters compare what's dispensed through the draught lines against what it delivered, and differences get highlighted. It lists the innocent reasons itself: big changes in stock levels and line cleaning, alongside buying outside the tie. Packaged products are monitored too. Representatives visit to look into discrepancies, checking stock levels, dispense equipment, cellars and fridges, and they can access the cellar without an appointment.

On evidence, it says the meter data won't be used in isolation and that it'll provide one or more other pieces of evidence. Its 2021 guide to flow monitoring listed what that can include: product found that wasn't bought from them, packaged product without their marking, a signed undertakings letter, stock reports, turnover that doesn't match VAT returns, surveillance, third-party supplier paperwork, products not on their price list, test purchases, container balances and container tracking.

Look at that list. Stock reports are on it. So is turnover against your VAT returns. The same paperwork that can be used against you is the paperwork that clears you, if it's yours, it's complete and it's dated.

The charges Star publishes:

What	Published charge	Per pint (my arithmetic)
Draught bought outside the tie	£190 per barrel (36 gallons)	About 66p (288 pints in a barrel)
Packaged bought outside the tie	£10 per case	Depends on the case size
Admin fee	£300 + VAT each time a breach is identified	n/a
Tampering with meters	Repair costs, which it says can run to several thousand pounds, plus backdated loss of profit	n/a

And on accuracy: for a damages claim the meter's calibration setting is checked. If it reads more than plus or minus 1.75% out on a keg meter, or 3.5% on a cask meter, it's recalibrated. If the new setting shows the meter had been overstating, the damages stay at the original lower setting for the whole period. Star's guide also says that in the event of a breach it may ask you to sign an undertakings letter confirming one has taken place.

The tolerance sum nobody does

Here's the bit I'd want every tied tenant to see. Take a pub pouring 1,000 pints of keg beer a week. If the meters read 1.75% high, that's 17.5 pints a week counted as dispensed that never came out of a tap. Over a year it's 910 pints, a bit over three barrels. At the published £190 a barrel, that's about £600 of "loss of profit", plus the £300 admin fee and VAT.

On the published procedure, a meter that's 1.5% out isn't recalibrated, because it's inside the tolerance. I'm not saying any meter in any pub is reading high. I'm saying a gap of that size can exist without anyone doing anything wrong, and the only way to show that is your own count of what came in and what's left. The same applies to cask, with twice the tolerance.

Those are my sums on the published figures, not a claim about any real pub.

Why the meter and the deliveries disagree when nobody's done anything

This is the table I'd keep in the cellar. Each line is a legitimate reason dispensed and delivered won't match in a given period, and the record that proves it.

Reason	What it does to the comparison	The record that shows it
Stock running down in the cellar	You pour more than was delivered this period, because last period's kegs are being used	A dated full-keg count at the end of every period
Stock building up (a big order before a bank holiday or a match)	Delivered runs ahead of dispensed, then flips the other way	The same dated count, plus the delivery notes
Line cleaning	Beer pulled through and water run through the system around a clean	A line cleaning log with dates and times
A line switched to a different beer without the system being told	One brand looks over-poured, another under, the total roughly matches	A line-to-product log every time you change what's on a tap
Short or substituted deliveries	The pubco's record says 10 kegs, the cellar got 9, or got a different beer	The delivery note marked up and signed at the door
Kegs returned for credit	Credited as returned, but some of it went through the meter first	Ullage paperwork with keg numbers
Cask sediment	The cask holds more than the sellable volume	The sediment allowance by brand (Star's says its price list carries it)
Meter drift inside the tolerance	A steady small gap every week, same direction	Your own weekly comparison of meter data against counts
Product you're allowed to buy elsewhere	A guest beer or product your agreement permits shows on a meter with no tied delivery behind it	The clause in your agreement and the supplier invoice

The line switch one catches people out more than you'd think. Swap a lager for a seasonal on line 4, forget to tell anyone, and the meter keeps calling it the lager. Now the lager looks like it sold far more than was delivered and the seasonal looks like it never sold. Nothing's missing. The labels are wrong. The guide to new drink line setup mistakes covers the same problem on the stocktake side.

The records I'd keep, starting this week

None of this needs a letter to have arrived. It's the same paperwork that makes a stocktake accurate, kept in a way someone else can check.

A dated cellar count every period. Full kegs and casks by product, with the date and time. This is the single most useful record against a flow meter, because it's what turns "dispensed versus delivered" into "dispensed versus what you actually used". The pints-in-a-keg guide has the container sizes and the keg calibration guide covers weighing part kegs.

Every delivery note, marked up at the door. Count before you sign, write the shortfall on the note, get a credit reference. The short delivery guide goes through it.

Returns and ullage with keg numbers. See the ullage claims guide and the empty kegs guide, because container balances are on the evidence list too.

A line cleaning log. Date, time, which lines. The line cleaning guide has what it costs in beer.

A line-to-product log. Every time a tap changes, write down the date, the line and the new product.

Till sales by product, weekly. Your till should roughly agree with the meter. If it doesn't, find out why before anyone else asks. The till not matching guide helps.

Your own copy of the meter data. Star's guide says tenants can access online reports and get logins from their BDM or the monitoring supplier. Whoever your pubco uses, ask. Then look at it weekly against your counts. If a product drifts the same way every week, raise it in writing before it becomes their question.

If the letter comes

I'm not a lawyer, and if real money's at stake, get advice. But this is the order I'd go in.

Ask for the additional evidence in writing. Regulation 51 says the meter reading isn't enough on its own. Ask what else they're relying on and for copies.

Ask for the calibration check and to be there. Star's 2021 guide said tenants could be present when the meter's checked with a Trading Standards-approved vessel, and that the calibration details would be kept for a challenge. Ask for the readings, product by product.

Put your records next to theirs, product by product. Opening count, deliveries, closing count, line cleans, returns, line changes. Most innocent gaps show up straight away when you do this per product rather than in total.

Don't sign an undertakings letter you don't agree with. It's a written admission. Take advice first.

Know where to go. If you think your pubco has broken the Code, the Pubs Code Adjudicator handles disputes through arbitration and can investigate. The tied price rises guide covers how to raise a Code issue and the guide to the Stonegate investigation shows what a PCA investigation looks like.

Where StockTap fits, and where it doesn't

StockTap doesn't connect to any flow monitoring system, and I wouldn't want it to. The point is an independent record that's yours. What it does: dated counts of kegs, casks and bottles (by weight or by eye), delivery notes scanned and checked against what arrived, wastage logged with a reason and a date, and spot checks against the till. All of it exports to CSV, so if you ever need to hand a product-by-product picture to someone, it's there.

It won't tell you whether a pubco's meter is accurate. It'll tell you what came in, what went out and what's left, which is the "additional evidence about purchase and stock" the Code is talking about. The pubco stock audit guide and the chargeback guide cover the rest of the same fight.

Common questions

Can a pubco charge me just because the flow meter shows more beer sold than delivered?

Not under the Pubs Code. Regulation 51 says a pub company covered by the Code can't subject a tied tenant to detriment or liability from a flow meter reading without additional evidence about the purchase and stock of alcohol at the pub. Other evidence can include stock reports, product found on site and turnover against VAT returns.

How accurate are pub flow meters?

There's no single answer, it depends on the system and the calibration. Star Pubs publishes a tolerance of plus or minus 1.75% for keg meters and 3.5% for cask meters, and only recalibrates for a damages claim if a meter is outside that. On 1,000 keg pints a week, 1.75% is about 17 pints.

What does buying out cost if a pubco finds it?

Each agreement differs. Star Pubs publishes £190 per 36-gallon barrel for draught (about 66p a pint), £10 per case for packaged, a £300 plus VAT admin fee each time, and repair costs plus backdated loss of profit if meters were tampered with.

Can I see my own flow monitoring data?

Usually, yes. Star Pubs says its tenants can access online dispense reports with a login from their BDM or the monitoring supplier. Ask your BDM in writing. Checking it weekly against your own cellar counts is the best way to spot an innocent gap early.

What records protect me against a buying-out allegation?

Dated cellar counts each period, marked-up delivery notes, returns and ullage paperwork with keg numbers, a line cleaning log, a log of which product is on which line, and weekly till sales by product. Together they show what came in, what was used and what's left.