Home made flavoured alcoholic drinks- legalities of selling?

[Pinky and Perky]

Hi guys looking for some advice.
As always directgov is not clear and there appears to be plenty of back room lawyer type advice on the web, so I thought I would seek the advice of the piston heads crew.
My wife and a friend have for some time made flavoured gins, vodka's etc, mainly for presents and home consumption.
They've decided to step it up a gear and are thinking about selling at local craft fairs, farmers markets etc.
I believe they need a license but not sure which one, they believe they can get around it by selling raffle tickets ( everyone's a winner style) but to me (and I'm sure HMRC) this is just avoiding the obiovious.
For clarity the alcohol is purchased (duty paid) fruit and ingredients added (fruit is home grown and picked). Then it's re bottled.
As always apologies to the grammar and spelling police

[davepoth]

https://www.gov.uk/alcohol-duties#spirits-rectifie...

Gov.uk said:

Combining spirits

If you mix or combine spirits - whether previously compounded or not - with any other substance (apart from water) that will distinctly alter the character or flavour of the original product, you must take out a compounder’s licence. You can do this using form L 5. This applies to the manufacture of:

alcoholic drinks - but not including mixed drinks solely for consumption on the premises, for example cocktails
ingredients for making, or adding to, alcoholic drinks

Find form L 5 to apply for a compounder’s licence on the HMRC website.

Unless you already operate from an excise warehouse, you will have to ‘make entry’ of the premises and plant and have it approved by HMRC before you start operations.

The manufacture of certain products does not require a compounder’s licence. However, depending on the circumstances, you may want one anyway to allow you to claim spirits drawback - ie, a refund of the duty you pay when you purchase the spirits. This applies to:

mixed drinks or foodstuffs solely for consumption on the premises
food products
flavouring essences not for alcoholic drinks
medicines
perfumery

Find guidance on applying for a compounder’s licence in Information Sheet 11/12 on the HMRC website.

[R_U_LOCAL]

In order to sell or supply alcohol to the public you need to comply with the Licensing Act 2003. So you would need either a premises licence or a temporary event notice.

If you're starting out on a small scale with local markets wtc, start by asking the organisers if there is a premises licence in place which allows the sale & supply of alcohol. If there is, then you will be able to sell under the existing licence as long as you comply with the licence conditions.

If there is not a premises licence in place, you can submit a temporary event notice (TEN) to the local authority covering the area in which the market is situated. A TEN costs £21 and you must send copies to the police and environmental health.

You should give 10 or more days notice of a TEN, but you can submit a limited number of late TENs with 5 to 9 days notice.

There are some restrictions - the overall attendence at the event must be less than 500 people and you can only submit 5 TENs per calender year, but if you apply for a personal alcohol licence, this increases to 50 TENs per year. Individual premises can only hold a maximum of 12 TENs per calendar year too.

The "raffle" suggestion is a red herring and you would still need a licence or TEN to supply alcohol to the public, even if it were through a raffle.

You're not manufacturing the alcohol, so there are no complications in respect of spirit duty etc, but I'm a local authority licensing manager, so my knowledge on the duty side are limited.

The TEN procedure above sounds complicated, but it's really not & the licensing department at your local council should be happy to help.

[Pinky and Perky]

Thanks guys I appreciate it.

[prand]

Pinky and Perky said:

Thanks guys I appreciate it.

In addition to the controls over production and the premises license, a seller (or employee) must also have a personal license to sell alcohol, unless it is under a TENS.

So if a market has a regular premises license, then a personal license to sell alcohol is required, if it's a one-off fete or show, covered by a TENS, then no Personal License is required.

If your wife wants to sell online, the distribution point has to have a premises license. This could be a warehouse or your home, but be warned, local licensing authority will want to have very detailed info about the area to e licensed; security, fire, access by minors, insurance etc, which may keeping it in the garage or spare room difficult. Could also affect mortgage and house insurance plus neighbours might not like the idea of living next to a licensed premises, as you need to post a license notice outside the property for 28 days plus an advert in the local paper.

My wife has done this for selling wine locally and online. she decided to rent a independant local storage unit who was willing to have a license on their premises.