Philip Hammond has signalled that the government is looking at alleviating the impact of changes to business rates, which have triggered a fierce backlash among some Conservative MPs.

The chancellor told his party’s influential 1922 committee that he was in “listening mode” over the policy, which will see rates rise by 13% in his own Runnymede and Weybridge constituency.

Theresa May’s Maidenhead seat is also affected by a shakeup in the way the tax is calculated, using a revaluation of property prices, in a move that has triggered an outcry in parts of the business community and in the media.

Treasury sources said Hammond told MPs he was also aware of the challenges of the growing digital economy, amid warnings that smaller shops could go under as a result of increases, while the online retail giant Amazon would enjoy a cut in the tax bill paid for its warehouses.

A source said: “It is a real challenge to the tax system when you have a specific tax based on property. It is very difficult and he told MPs that he was alive to this but that it isn’t something that can be changed overnight.”

New rates will be set by the Valuation Office Agency in the coming weeks, and rates are due to rise unusually sharply in areas where property prices have increased sharply in recent years.

The increase in business rates from April is the result of a new revaluation of the rental value of property in Britain. This is supposed to take place every five years but the previous revaluation was controversially delayed by the government for two years, making the change in bills from April more pronounced.

London will be particularly affected because the rental value of property in prime areas has increased substantially since the financial crisis.

Hammond told colleagues at the closed-doors meeting that business groups who were now critical of the policy had been supportive during a consultation. The source said Hammond would listen but was not committing to a change in policy at this stage. The meeting came after senior ministers wrote to Conservative MPs in an attempt to stave off a rebellion over the revaluation.

The communities and local government secretary, Sajid Javid, and the Treasury chief secretary, David Gauke, said there had been “a relentless campaign of distortions and half-truths” about the planned changes. They insisted that bills would not rise for most firms.

Earlier Gauke had hit back at “scaremongering” by valuation agents. He insisted that the vast majority of businesses would see no change, or a fall, in their rates, while a quarter would see their bills rise.

However, Javid and Gauke have come under pressure after it was suggested they may have underestimated the rates rises by 5-7% in figures sent out with the letter.

An analysis by the consultancy Gerald Eve was also reported to show that rates will only fall in 135 council areas, not the 259 claimed by the government.

The controversy led to the Liberal Democrats accusing the ministers of misleading people with “half truths”.