Estates management record 2020/21 - Commercial space
Version 1.0 Produced 2021-10-29
The following guidance will support Higher education providers with the return of commercial space in the Estates Management Record (EMR).
A commercial space is regarded as one where the occupant of the specified space is a third party and not the HE provider or a subsidiary of them (A subsidiary is wholly or partly owned by the provider, and the provider holds a controlling interest). The third party does not have to be paying rent. In addition, the occupying staff would not be expected to be on the provider payroll.
Where a provider lets accommodation, and the accommodation can be rented by any third party, even if provider staff are renting the accommodation, this should still be returned as commercial space.
The commercial space should be a longer-term allocation, rather than a short-term leasing of for example, a lecture theatre hired out for a conference. Typically, there would be a lease agreement in place.
Principles of returning commercial space
Commercial space that can be separately identified as a discrete area together with all associated costs, for example energy, waste, and emissions should be excluded from the EMR.
Where the associated costs, such as waste and energy cannot be separately identified for a commercial space area, this is when the commercial space area should be included in the EMR. Providers should return the commercial space area as per other areas under the appropriate space measurement field, for example Residential GIA. The associated costs should also be included in the return. Providers should also return the space as part of the total commercial space fields for GIA and NIA. This way, the total commercial space area can be distinguished from either Total GIA or Total NIA.
Relevant fields
The fields in which returnable commercial space should be included are:- Teaching offices NIA (SMNIATEO).
- Teaching not offices NIA (SMNIATE).
- Teaching NIA total (SMNIATET).
- Research offices NIA (SMNIAREO).
- Research not offices NIA (SMNIARE).
- Research NIA total (SMNIARET).
- Support offices NIA (SMNIASO).
- Support not offices NIA (SMNIAS).
- Support NIA total (SMNIAST).
- Support NIA associated with catering (SMNIACS).
- Support NIA learning centre space (SMNIALC).
- Non-residential NIA vacant (SMNIANRV).
- Non-residential NIA other (SMNIANRO).
- Non-residential NIA total (SMNIANRT).
- Residential NIA (SMNIAR).
- Total NIA (SMNIAT).
- Non-residential GIA (SMGIANR).
- Residential GIA (SMGIAR).
- Total GIA (SMGIAT).
In addition, the total of all returnable Gross Internal Area (GIA) commercial space and Net Internal Area (NIA) commercial space should be included in:
Need help?
Contact Liaison by email or on +44 (0)1242 388 531.