What to Do If Your Planning Application Fails

Even with thorough preparation and great presentation, planning applications don’t always go as you’d like.

But a query or problem raised during the course of an application doesn’t necessarily mean the end of your project. So, what are your options if the process starts to go wrong?

During the course of a planning application, various people are consulted – parish council, neighbours, highways authority, tree officer and so on.

An objection raised by a consultee doesn’t necessarily mean the planning officer dealing with the application is going to agree or be bothered by it. For example, an objection from a parish council might be based on something other than valid planning considerations and so be largely ignored.

But genuine objections, valid points of concern from consultees and any issues raised by the planning officer must be addressed. You’ve got a number of options:

1. Attempt to overcome the problem while the application is running
2. Withdraw and re-submit
3. Allow the application to continue and try to get it to planning committee
4. Allow the application to continue to refusal and consider an appeal

So what can you expect from each route?

Overcoming planning objections

The challenge with resolving objections during the course of an application is that they often don’t come up until late in the eight week consultation period.

If your plans need changing significantly, or if you have to produce further information to support your scheme, then there might not be time as councils are often averse to letting applications stray over their eight week target.

Even when there’s time for you to get revised plans drawn up, for example, if the changes are at all significant, the council will need to re-consult neighbours (etc) on them.

This process will almost certainly exceed the application’s time limit.

So, by all means make small adjustments to plans or add new bits of information if requested, but always check with the planning officer that there’s time.

Occasionally, where a planning officer knows a solution to a problem is imminent, they might be prepared to give you a few extra days grace.

An alternative approach that might get you over the issue is to suggest it’s dealt with by a condition attached to the planning permission. That enables the application to be granted within the time limit, albeit you’ve then got to go back to the council later, to tidy up the loose end.

Withdraw and re-submit planning application

When it’s clear an objection can’t be dealt with in the time limit, but a solution appears achievable, consider withdrawing the application, making the necessary amendments and re-submitting.

Assuming your new proposal is similar to the first, then you probably won’t have to pay a second application fee, provided you re-submit within 12 months.

This process allows you to tweak your scheme so the planning officer is happy with it, before re-submitting with the near certainty of success. The principal cost is lost time.

Planning committee

Getting an application to planning committee offers an opportunity to get the decision away from the planning officer, albeit into the often unpredictable hands of the planning committee members where a simple majority determines the result.