On 19 June 2020 the Government published the Code of Practice for commercial property relationships during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Code is voluntary rather than mandatory. It’s objective is to provide a level of support to all those stakeholders in the commercial property sector. This ranges from customers and occupiers, through to the landlords and lenders.

Overage provisions take many different forms to accommodate a variety of scenarios. The common theme among all though is they cover the situation where the parties to a property transaction agree that the circumstances justify the seller being entitled to further payments in relation to the property being sold, at some point in the future. The parties are free to set the terms of the overage provisions which will often be shaped by current market conditions and the respective bargaining strengths of the parties involved.