Planning Appeals

1. Planning Appeals

You can appeal if your planning application has been rejected, you receive an enforcement notice or you are unhappy with some of the conditions of your planning approval.

The rules and regulations surrounding planning are there to ensure that not only are buildings safe but that they do not impede on their surroundings. However, if planning has been refused for your project or you are unhappy with any conditions or decision the good news is that you do have the option to appeal.

The most common appeal is in respect of a refusal of planning permission, although you can also appeal against any conditions that have been imposed on a planning permission or if the local planning authority has failed to make a decision within a specified timeframe (usually 8 or 13 weeks depending upon the type of application).

Planning appeals can be very complex and according to the planning inspectorate, only 1 in 3 appeals are successful. You can appeal yourself or you can instruct experts such as Studio Charrette to act on our behalf. However, you decide to proceed it is important to note that you do only get one chance to appeal so you need to get it right the first time.

2. Why do you need to appeal?

There are many reasons for planning rejections for example, it could be something very straight forward such as missing supporting evidence, minor mistakes with the application, minor design alterations or simply a resubmission of the same documents and a different type of planning application. 

Unfortunately, there are also lots of much more complicated reasons why planning applications may be rejected or have seemingly unreasonable conditions attached to an approval. Planning authorities are run by regular people as with any business. Sometimes planning policies and applications can be subjective, misinterpreted or simply applied incorrectly. 

In these cases, a complex appeal would be required and given that you are appealing to the same planning authority that made the determination a very strong case would need to be put forward to stand a chance of success. The first step is clearly understanding what you wish to appeal and then prepare the supporting evidence ready to appeal the decision and justify why your application should in fact be approved.

3. When can you appeal?

If you have been rejected, received a condition or decision that you disagree with, you have 6 months from the decision date to appeal. This might sound like a long time but appeals can be very complicated so, therefore, take a long time to prepare. If you leave it too late to start you might find yourself racing against the clock and under even more undue pressure. From 6 months and just 1 day, you can no longer appeal.

If you have received an enforcement notice you need to act fast as you only have 28 days to submit your appeal. Failure to comply with an enforcement notice is a criminal offence risking heavy fines and even imprisonment. 

If you have not received your planning decision within 8 weeks from the date your application was validated then you have the right to appeal within 6 months of the date the decision was due.

4. What is the appeal process?

Most planning appeals are submitted in writing by the appellant or an agent acting on their behalf. Written statements and other supporting evidence will need to be submitted to clearly justify why the planning authority’s initial decision was wrong. The planning authority will also submit written evidence to justify why they feel they have made the correct decision.  

Once the appeal has been submitted there will be some strict timeframes for a variety of written submissions to be made. For householder applications, once the appeal is validated there is no further opportunity to add evidence or documentation to the appeal so it is essential to get it right the first time. 

The planning inspectorate will make the determination on your appeal which can take up to 13 weeks. The good news is that there is no cost to submit an appeal however, you do also only get one go. 

5. Need help with a planning appeal?

Studio Charrette who are a partner of the government’s planning portal can conduct a planning appraisal. This involves a chartered planning consultant researching the project to check the relevant planning and design policies, they also check the planning history and look for any hidden constraints. They then compare their findings with what you want to appeal. This takes about an hour at which point they can call to advise what would be required and answer any questions. Subsequently we forward the advice in writing.

There are never any guarantees with planning permission or permitted development, because ultimately only your planning authority can make the legal determination. However, with a planning appraisal we can let you know whether your planning appeal would be feasible, assuming it is what the best route forward would be and the likelihood of success. As part of the planning appraisal, we can also advise you on building regulations, structural engineering calculations and construction.

Assuming the planning appraisal is positive we can then provide a quote for any services you want help with including architectural design, planning permission, building regulations and construction. Should you decide to instruct Studio Charrette can take care of everything for you from start to finish.

If you have any questions or would like to arrange a planning appraisal for your project, contact us today and a member of our team will contact you shortly.

6. Price Match Guarantee

We fully appreciate any unexpected cost is going to be unwelcome, but you will be pleased to know our prices are so competitive, we offer a price match guarantee and in most cases the planning costs are insignificant compared to the development.

If there is a way to help you achieve a positive outcome our chartered planning consultants will give you the best chance of success. Equally if we think it simply isn’t feasible, while it may be bad news, we are obliged to give you frank and honest professional advice.

7. Choose Studio Charrette!

If you choose to instruct Studio Charrette, we will take care of everything for you from this point including preparing all the necessary supporting evidence, architectural drawings, submitting and managing your application throughout the entire process.

We will keep you updated from start to finish until we receive a decision, which thanks to our planning appraisals is usually positive.