Pre-application planning advice service

Any pre-application advice we give you is non-binding. The pre-application advice will aid the overall development process and be a material consideration in a subsequent planning application.

Advice may be given without a site visit, is time-limited and is based on guidance, policies and legislation in force at the time it is given.

Advice for schemes submitted more than one year after the date of issue will not be valid.

We will give you the best advice possible on the information and proposals that you submit within agreed timeframes.

If significant alterations to a scheme are required, or another meeting requested, a further round of correspondence and meetings may need to take place. This will cost the follow up meeting charge.

Confidentiality - homeowners

• your pre-application request and advice will not be published on our website
• we do not notify neighbours when you request advice

Confidentiality - developers

• your pre-application request and advice will not be published on our website
• your proposal is subject to the views of statutory consultees - we have to take their representations into account in the preparation of any report on the subsequent application

Very large and complex proposals

In accordance with the Council’s adopted Statement of Community Involvement, the Council will encourage applicants of large or potentially controversial schemes to involve the local community prior to submitting a planning application.

For very large scale proposals with highly complex issues falling in Category A, there may need to be a series of remote meetings and discussions before a formal application is submitted. 

These types of proposals will be dealt with under our bespoke charging regime where the number of remote meetings and timescales will be agreed and project managed. Once the timescales and number of remote meetings has been agreed we will advise you of the charge for this service.

Given other workload commitments and the complexity of the advice required, at times the timeframes may be subject to revisions, of which you will be kept informed.

We will not enter into preliminary discussions on applicable schemes outside the pre-application advice service.

Other organisations you could contact

It might be useful for applicants and their agents to separately contact statutory consultees such as:

• The Environment Agency
• Transport for London
• the Greater London Authority

All offer a pre-application enquiry service which can be used to obtain their initial views.