Submit a complaint about the liquor industry

Liquor Control Victoria (LCV) regulates Victoria’s licensing, sale and supply of liquor. We aim to minimise harm by ensuring Victorian organisations and entities comply with the laws of Victoria.

To provide feedback about our services, please email contact@liquor.vic.gov.au. To provide feedback on the liquor industry, use the form below.

We can investigate

Types of issues we can investigate:

• liquor advertising or liquor-related promotions
• how licensees operate their licensed premises
• Responsible Service of Alcohol (RSA)
• underage drinking or alcohol supply
• noise, drunken behaviour or anti-social behaviour at a licensed venue.

Property owners can make noise and amenity complaints if their property is directly impacted by patrons of the licensed premises. This includes:

• violent behaviour
• drunkenness
• vandalism
• disorderly behaviour of the patrons
• noise disturbances to people in other premises
• footpath obstructions
• littering.

We cannot investigate

LCV is not always able to investigate your complaint. If your complaint cannot be dealt with by us, you may be referred to another organisation.

We cannot investigate:

• if you’ve been barred by a licensed premises or Victoria Police
• police matters such as public order offences and criminal offences
• council-related matters such as local planning permits
• businesses licensed outside Victoria (even if they are advertising in the state)
• customer service you received at a venue
• civil matters in relation to debt recovery or breach of civil contract.

Information we need from you

You do not need to give us your personal information but if we have questions about your complaint, it is helpful to be able to contact you.

To make your complaint please tell us:

• name of premises or organisation you are complaining about
• location of the premises
• time of the matter you are complaining about
• date it occured
• the names or roles of any people involved (if you know this).

If you are making a noise complaint (see below), we encourage you to lodge a record of noise complaints logbook. This helps you include a detailed summary of what has occurred, and specific times and dates when there has been too much noise.

Any personal details that you give us are private and confidential and will not be shared with other parties.

Noise complaints

If your complaint relates to noise from a liquor licensed venue, we encourage you to keep a detailed diary or log of noise disturbances.

This should include the time, the kind of noise and the source. You can provide this diary to our investigating inspector.

Inspectors may need to access to your home at the times the noise occurs. This is so they can assess the noise levels and identify or confirm the source.

If you do not keep the noise diary or allow inspectors access to your property, we may not be able to investigate your complaint and the matter will end.

If we determine that a licensed premise is not meeting their obligations a graduated enforcement response may be implemented. For example, for a first complaint, LCV may seek voluntary compliance from licensees. If the issue continues, LCV can issue warnings, penalties, and potentially seek a change to license conditions.

When we investigate a noise complaint we also might take into account:

• previous complaints, investigations and outcomes
• the nature of the area where the licensed premise is located, for example, entertainment areas have higher noise and amenity allowances
• length of time a venue has operated compared to surrounding residences.