It does not look like all businesses in Gloucestershire will ever get all they are due from the Government's rate relieve scheme, coming up short by hundreds of thousands of pounds.

As we reported last year the first round of funding to the county's six local authorities saw four understand the rules in such a way Gloucestershire businesses missed out to the tune of £220,000-plus.

Thanks in a large part to the work of campaigner Ian Sloan, whose research with Retail Express Punchline put before councils last year some money was rescued before it could be sent back to Government.

Cheltenham Borough Council managed to distribute the £34,542 remaining from its £270,759 which would otherwise have gone back to Government because of confusion over a deadline extension.

This year Cheltenham has delivered most of its funds, as has the Forest of Dean, which last year sent £14,474 of its £168,518 back to Government. Whether that is down to them realising their error, and changing their criteria, or this year's small pot of money being a better fit for the their self-imposed systems is unclear.

At Gloucester City Council it is a different story. Its formula saw it under allocate £99,652 last year. Punchline pointed out the points raised by Mr Sloan at the time, which could have seen it change its criteria and deliver all of its money, but this year it looks to have persisted with its original criteria and as a result under allocated £48,000 .

Again, the amounts being less as the funds given to all councils dramatically taper down over the four-year period of the relief scheme.

Mr Sloan, who works for Bankier Sloan Chartered Surveyors, which has offices in the Cotswolds, said: "Councils can give the money to any business that has seen a rate rise. That is the only rule set by Government. They have said they do not care how they spend it as long as they pay it to people who have had a rate increase.

"Some councils have written a catch-all criteria which means officers then have the right to spend it as they wish.

"We have spent many hours over the last two years trying to help councillors throughout England understand this scheme.

"Sadly many failed to acknowledge our guidance, and that of central government, and believed incorrectly that central government had set the criteria that they needed to follow. The funding was ring-fenced and has now been returned to the government."

Read more: £220,000-plus of rate relief for Gloucestershire businesses lost 

He added: "We have despaired at moments over the last two years as councils across England have in many cases failed to alter their schemes in order to insure they spent the free funding provided by Central Government intended to help local businesses. The funding was ring-fenced and has now been returned to the government ."

We asked Gloucester again this year whether it was going to look at its criteria, in light of Mr Sloan's national campaign which has seen scores of local authorities change their ways and deliver many millions extra to businesses, if only to benefit firms in the final year of the scheme next year. Gloucester City Council has not responded on that point.

Tewkesbury did talk to Punchline and acknowledged it was aware of the issue with its criteria, but because of the tapering down of relief it expected next year's considerably reduced amount of £5K to be given out in its entirety.

This year Tewkesbury was given £92,953 and under allocated £28,000. Last year it received £191,375, and under allocated £105,734 or 55.25 per cent.

Added together, last year's £220,000 and this year's £48,000-plus it means Gloucestershire businesses which qualified for rate relief under the Government scheme will have lost out to the tune of £268,000 to date.

UK-wide, according to figures collected by hundreds of freedom of information requests by Mr Sloan and Retail Express, there has been a combined under allocation in 2017/18 and 2018/19 of £27,447,439.

Graeme Simpson, head of corporate services at Tewkesbury Borough Council, said: "Tewkesbury Borough Council has spent £64,635 of the £93,000 allocated for business rate relief (for this year just gone).

"In line with the guidance from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG), we believed any unspent allocation, as at March 31, needed to be returned to MHCLG. However, when MHCLG clarified that we could spend the remaining funds beyond the 31 March, we were able to allocate more funds to businesses.

Read more: £220,000-plus of rate relief for Gloucestershire businesses lost 

"We are very keen to use this funding to support local businesses and would encourage business owners to contact us to make sure they are receiving all the support they are entitled to. We're pleased to say we anticipate this and next year's funding will be allocated entirely."

A spokesperson for Gloucester City Council said: "For the 2017/2018 claim period, we directly targeted businesses that were potentially eligible for the discretionary rate relief by sending them an application form.

"All eligible businesses who made an application were granted the appropriate discretionary rate relief. We followed this up by telephoning the businesses who did not initially apply to offer our assistance and advice to help them to make a claim.

"Unfortunately, some businesses did not apply for the relief so in the 2017-18 period, discretionary revaluation relief of about £102k was claimed.

"Under the terms of the scheme, the amounts available in future periods were reduced in direct proportion to the amounts claimed in the previous year. This means that there was around £50k available for distribution in 2018-19 not the £98k originally allocated."

Read more: £220,000-plus of rate relief for Gloucestershire businesses lost