Tied price rise? How to check if it's significant under the Pubs Code, the 6.5% beer trigger right now, and the 14 and 21-day windows it opens

A tied price rise only opens your Pubs Code rights if it's a "significant increase in price": the rise has to beat the latest annual CPI figure plus 3% for beer, plus 8% for other alcoholic drinks, or plus 20% for other products and services. With September's CPI at 3.5%, published on 21 October 2026, that's 6.5% for beer on any invoice issued from 22 October until the next figure lands on 18 November. If your rise counts, the pub company must receive a rent assessment request within 14 days and an MRO notice within 21 days, both counted from the invoice. Below is the exact sum, a worked example that misses by a hair, and what to do whichever way yours falls.

I run a tied pub. I'm not a lawyer and nothing here is legal advice. It's a licensee reading the same PCA factsheets you can read, with the arithmetic done. When the numbers get serious, pay for an hour with a solicitor who does Pubs Code work. What I can do is make sure you never miss the window because nobody told you it existed.

First, check the Code covers you

The Pubs Code applies in England and Wales, and only to tied tenants of the six companies with 500 or more tied pubs: Stonegate, Greene King, Admiral Taverns, Star Pubs & Bars, Marston's and Punch. A family brewer or a smaller pubco under that line isn't covered. Neither, in practice, is a percentage-of-sales management or partnership deal: the regulator said in March 2025 it won't currently enforce the Code on those, which I go through in the Punch results piece.

The triggers right now

Significant increase thresholds for invoices issued 22 October to 18 November 2026 (CPI 3.5%)

What went up	Fixed percentage	The rise is significant if it beats
Beer	3%	6.5%
Other alcoholic drinks	8%	11.5%
Non-alcoholic products and services	20%	23.5%

The CPI figure that counts is the one most recently published before the day the invoice was issued. So an invoice dated 21 October was tested against August's 3.1%, a 6.1% trigger for beer, and one dated 22 October against 6.5%. Services count too: the PCA's examples include maintenance and compliance packages, marketing support and insurance recharged to you, which is its own fight in my insurance recharge guide.

The exact sum, step by step

This is where most people's back-of-a-beer-mat version goes wrong. The PCA's factsheet sets it out in seven steps. In plain English:

1. Current period. The four weeks ending on the day the invoice showing the rise was issued.
2. Comparison period. The four weeks starting 12 months before that invoice date.
3. Category. Beer, other alcohol, or other products and services. Do each one separately.
4. List and price. Take every tied item in that category you were invoiced for in the comparison period, under the same name and unit, that you were also invoiced for in the current period. B is what those items actually cost you back then. A is the same quantities priced at the last price you were invoiced in the current period.
5. Strip out VAT and excise duty, both sides, and ignore any discount the pubco wasn't contractually obliged to give you.
6. Percentage rise = (A minus B) divided by B.
7. Compare it with CPI plus the fixed percentage for that category.

Two consequences worth knowing. Because duty comes out of both sides, a duty change in the Budget on 28 October can't trigger anything on its own; the rates to strip out are in my duty guide. And it isn't an MRO event if the rise was reasonably foreseeable when your agreement was granted or at your last rent assessment, so a rise written into the lease doesn't count.

A worked example that misses by 0.05%

Tied beer, prices ex VAT and ex duty, illustrative

Item	Kegs in comparison period	Price then	Cost then (B)	Price now	Same kegs at today's price (A)
Lager A	6	£100	£600	£108	£648
Ale B	4	£80	£320	£85	£340
Lager C	10	£60	£600	£63	£630
Total			£1,520		£1,618

£98 on £1,520 is a 6.45% rise. On an invoice dated 22 October the trigger is 6.5%, so it isn't significant, by five hundredths of a point. The same rise on an invoice dated 21 October, tested against 6.1%, would have been. That's why you do the sum on paper with the real invoice dates rather than eyeballing the price list letter. Your lager going up 8% means nothing on its own; it's the weighted total of the whole category that counts.

The two clocks

A significant increase gives you two separate rights, and both run from the invoice showing the new prices, not the price list letter.

• Rent assessment: the pub company must receive your request within 14 days, starting the day you receive the invoice. The tie is meant to be balanced by the rent, so if the wet side just got heavier, the rent is up for discussion. How that works is in rent assessment step by step.
• Market Rent Only: the pub company must receive your MRO notice within 21 days, starting the day after you receive the invoice. That's a request for a free-of-tie tenancy at an open-market rent. The process is in MRO step by step.

Note the word receive. Posting it on day 20 isn't good enough. The day a post-rise invoice lands, the diary entries go in before the delivery gets stacked, because nobody at the pubco is under any duty to remind you.

MRO is a lever, not just an exit

Most tenants who go down the MRO road don't end up free of tie. What often happens is the pubco, faced with losing the wholesale margin on your barrels, finds room it didn't have before, a better discount or a softer rent. The notice is the one moment you're negotiating with a real alternative on the table. Be straight with yourself about the other side too. Free of tie means an open-market rent, your own suppliers and no pubco when the boiler dies. Some tenants do the sums and stay tied on better terms, and that's a win. If a pubco doesn't play by the Code, the route is in referring a dispute to the PCA.

If it isn't significant: what you can still do

• Price the rise in pints. A £360 a month increase on your beer account is about 161 pints of gross profit at £2.23 a pint, around 37 a week. That turns a grumble at your BDM into arithmetic, and the visit notes worth keeping are in BDM visit notes.
• Reprice line by line, not 20p across the board. Which lines carry the rise and which you hold is in how to put drink prices up.
• Know what free trade pays. When I matched 18 kegs on a published tied list against a free-trade wholesaler, the middle figure was about 35% dearer tied. Method and table in tied vs free-trade beer prices.
• Keep this year's invoices. They're next year's comparison period. Without them you can't run the sum at all.

When the rises tend to land

They don't all come at once. Heineken put draught up 2.7% from February 2026, tracked line by line in supplier price rise tracking, and Diageo put Guinness Draught up 5.2% to the on-trade from April, worked through in what a pint of Guinness costs a pub. Your pubco's own list may move on its own date. Whatever the date, run the sum on the first invoice at the new prices.

The Stonegate investigation, and the mood this year

On 15 July 2026 the Pubs Code Adjudicator opened a formal investigation into Stonegate covering conduct from July 2021 to July 2026, including rent projections, information requests and business development managers. The call for evidence closed on 12 August and the investigation is ongoing; what it covers is in the Stonegate investigation explained. The PCA's 2026 survey of 1,201 tied tenants found 56% satisfied with their pub company, down five points, with Admiral top at 72% and Stonegate bottom at 39%. The message for every tied tenant is the same: the tenants who get anywhere are the ones with paperwork.

The paper trail is the whole game

Everything above runs on one habit: knowing your cost price per product over time, with dates. It settles whether a rise is significant, it feeds a rent assessment, and between rises it tells you your GP is drifting before the stocktaker's letter does. A folder and a spreadsheet work if you keep them up. In StockTap it's the Scan Delivery Note button: photograph the paperwork, approve the lines, and every product's cost history builds itself while the stock figures update.

Common questions

What counts as a significant price increase under the Pubs Code?

Compare what the tied items in one category cost you in a four-week comparison period a year ago with what the same quantities would cost at current prices, excluding VAT and excise duty. If the rise beats the latest CPI figure plus 3% for beer, 8% for other alcohol or 20% for other products and services, it's significant.

What is the significant price increase threshold for beer in October 2026?

For invoices issued from 22 October 2026 until the next CPI release on 18 November, the beer trigger is 6.5%, because September's CPI was 3.5%. Invoices dated before 22 October were tested against August's 3.1%, a 6.1% trigger.

How long do I have to act after a significant tied price rise?

The pub company must receive a rent assessment request within 14 days starting the day you receive the invoice, and an MRO notice within 21 days starting the day after you receive it. Both run from the invoice showing the new prices, not the price list letter.

Does a duty rise in the Budget count as a significant price increase?

No. The Pubs Code calculation excludes VAT and excise duty from both the old and new prices, so a duty change on its own cannot trigger it.

Does the Pubs Code apply to my pub?

Only if you're a tied tenant in England or Wales of a company with 500 or more tied pubs: Stonegate, Greene King, Admiral Taverns, Star Pubs & Bars, Marston's or Punch. Tenants of smaller pubcos and family brewers aren't covered, and the PCA is not currently enforcing the Code on profit or turnover share agreements.