About our fees
Our fees are designed to vastly enhance our planning service for all customers by ensuring we improve the quality of planning applications and have the right resources in place to provide a timely and efficient service.
For example invalid fees help address poor quality applications, which require significant officer time to correct – and in so doing slow down the processing of other applications due to the drain on officer resources.
Similarly amendment fees encourge developers to only submit plans when they are happy with them, rather than continously change designs throughout the process, sometimes triggering repeat and costly consultation exercises.
Correcting invalid applications and carrying out repeat changes to plans is not a service the council is required to provide and the services we offer in this regard are wholly optional/discretionary.
When we notify a customer that their application is invalid, we explain why and it is then up to the customer whether they opt to use our invalid service, or whether they would prefer us to return their application to them via the Planning Portal (less an admin fee) for them to resubmit independently.
Similarly when we notify a customer they need to pay an amendment fee if they want to change their plans, they can choose to withdraw their application or have their as submitted plans assessed.
As much as anything, the fees we charge are designed to act as a deterrent and encourage developers to ensure their applications are well thought through and valid at point of submission.
When an applicant decides to enter an invalid discussion because they need our support, it is wholly their decision to do so. Equally when a developer chooses to pay an amendment fee it is their choice to do so. When they do, they are effectively opting to use our discretionary planning services.
As a council we can put in place fees for discretionary services provided that ‘taking one financial year with another, the income from charges under that subsection does not exceed the cost of provision’, and putting in place set fees for certain activities is commonplace in councils across the country.
We recognise discretionary advice on some applications will take less time and others will take more, however the discretionary flat fees we charge help us to recover costs to ensure we have the right resources in place to provide support to all our customers.
Whilst we recognise other councils charge different fees, and we are also very aware that in many councils the planning service requires a significant subsidy from local council tax payers who may not be direct users of the service. Many councils also have significant backlogs of applications, resulting in slow decision making which impacts the wellbeing of applicants and the economy.
Our aim through the new charges is to ensure we have a planning service that is sufficiently funded by the people that use it, and that we support the local community by processing applications in a timely manner.