The Town and Country Planning (Fees for Applications and Deemed Applications – Requests and Site Visits) (England) Regulations 2012 (as amended) provide for the payment of fees to local planning authorities in respect of applications for planning permission, approval of matters reserved by an outline planning permission and applications for consent for the display of advertisements.
Following debates in Parliament, the Town and Country Planning (Fees for Applications, Deemed Applications, Requests and Site Visits) (England) (Amendment) Regulations 2023 have been approved and made on 8th November.
The regulations can be viewed here: www.legislation.gov.uk/id/uksi/2023/1197.
The regulations do the following:
- Increase planning application fees by 35% for applications for major development and 25% for all other applications.
- Introduce an annual indexation of planning applications fees, capped at 10%, from 1 April 2025.
- Remove the fee exemption for repeat applications (the ‘free-go’). An applicant will still be able to benefit from a free-go if their application was withdrawn or refused in the preceding 12 months, subject to all other conditions for the free-go being met.
- Reduce the Planning Guarantee for non-major planning applications from 26 to 16 weeks.
- Introduce a new prior approval fee of £120 for applications for prior approval for development by the Crown on closed defence sites.
The Planning Portal details the fees.
The cost of your planning application will depend on the type and scale of your development.
Use the Planning Portal Fee Calculator to calculate the cost online, or refer to the Fees List.
Some types of development and application do not have a fee. If you submit an application and it’s exempt from a fee, we’ll check this when we process your application.
The most common application types that you do not need to pay a fee for are:
- Listed Building Consent applications
- works to an existing house in order to provide access to the house, or inside the house, for a disabled person who lives there; this does not include the construction of a new house
- works with the sole purpose of providing a means of access to a disabled person to or within a building which is accessible to the public
- relevant demolition in a Conservation Area
- works to trees covered by a Tree Protection Order
- resubmitting an application within 12 months (see the ‘Free Go’ section)
Please look at the Planning Portal guide if you’re not sure if you need to pay a fee for the works you want to do.
Use the Pre-Application Advice fees page for details on the the cost of the service where you will also find details of the service offered.
Depending on the type of document you are looking for and when it was produced, you may be able to download it from our website or you may need to contact us to request it.
We make a charge for copies of documents as shown in the fees and charges book.
Further details regarding how to pay for an application can be viewed using the Online Payments information page.