Westminster Selective Licensing Wards: Which Areas Are Covered and Which Are Exempt

Westminster's selective licensing scheme does not cover the entire borough. It applies to 15 of the 18 electoral wards, split across two formal designations that both came into force on 24 November 2025 and run until 23 November 2030. Knowing exactly which designation your property falls under — or whether it is excluded entirely — is the first step before paying the £543 non-refundable Part A application fee.

Designation 1: Eight Northern and Western Wards

Designation 1 covers the north and north-west of the borough:

• Abbey Road
• Church Street
• Harrow Road
• Knightsbridge & Belgravia
• Little Venice
• Maida Vale
• Queen's Park
• Westbourne

Designation 2: Seven Central and Southern Wards

Designation 2 covers central and southern Westminster:

• Bayswater
• Hyde Park
• Lancaster Gate
• Marylebone
• Pimlico North
• Regent's Park
• West End

The Three Exempt Wards

Three wards are excluded from selective licensing altogether:

• Pimlico South
• St James's
• Vincent Square

If your rental property is in one of these three wards and you let to a single household or two sharers, you do not need a selective licence. But this exemption only covers selective licensing. If you let to three or four tenants forming multiple households, additional HMO licensing applies borough-wide — including in these three wards. Five or more occupants triggers mandatory HMO licensing everywhere.

Why You Cannot Rely on Postcodes

Electoral ward boundaries and postcode areas do not line up. A street in the SW1 postcode area might straddle Pimlico North (designated) and Vincent Square (exempt). The only reliable way to confirm your ward is Westminster's official GIS address lookup tool, which returns the exact ward for a specific property address.

Check your property address, download the result showing the date and ward, and keep it in your records. If you are within a selective licensing area, this dated screenshot is part of your compliance evidence. If the tool returns an ambiguous result for a boundary property, contact the council's private sector housing team at [email protected] for written confirmation.

Why the Split Into Two Designations Matters

Practically, the two designations carry the same fees (£995), the same conditions and the same five-year term. The split exists because each designation was a separate statutory instrument under Part 3 of the Housing Act 2004. For your application, the key distinction is that the council's portal routes you through a property-specific questionnaire based on your address — the designation number itself does not change what you pay or what documents you need.

The Westminster Landlord Licensing Guide includes the full ward verification walkthrough, the occupancy decision flowchart, and the fee calculator with discount stacking for both designations.

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