Planning Portal Reviews 

Having a national planning portal is great !

But

increasingly LPA s are randomly introducing their own forms and checklists that are far too complex, are poorly formatted for users ( not even editable documents in many cases )and frankly not fit for purpose …

This undermines the national planning portal and the centre needs to dictate to LPA s as it makes it a mockery.

Just this week had an LPA refuse to process a simple pre app without completing their 4 page sustainability check list.. really !!!

Central government needs to be stronger and put some common sense back into the purpose of a national planning portal.

There should be zero need for local documents in addition to all of the usual questions, which are often clumsy, ill informed, far too detailed and often trigger countless stupid reports costing thousands of £££ to prove nothing !

The process for submitting an application for approval of a condition on the planning permission was simple and fast.
Thank you

Used this site to help me make a planning application for a fence above the permitted development height. It made the process relatively simple and straightforward to the extent the Local council planning team had no queries

Nothing.
Not worth the money.

It is now 7 days since i submitted a request on the portal and i have had no contact other than an initial email receipt

A lengthy drawn out experience. The whole process took too long and was extremely costly. Our Application took just under a year to be approved. We submitted 31 supporting documents. Communication between our agent and the planning officer was very poor,

As a busy estate agent, being able to outsource our floorplans and photo touch-ups to a reliable and efficient company is essential. Planning Portal does an outstanding job and we can highly recommend their services. David's Homes, Cardiff.

More than anything it’s the ferociously high cost for two pensioners having to replace a couple of windows in our old terrace.

I just think you're a waste of money, I'd rather deal directly with my local council

Generally the planning application process is okay. However, on the documents to be submitted list at present you have for example ' Front elevation' or Rear elevation' as if they are individual drawings. I put all my elevations onto one drawing so it would be good to see 'Existing Elevations' and 'Proposed Elevations' options listed.

Use the planning portal often for group developments and find the nominate payment function very helpful

The portal guides one through the process in a step wise and easy to follow process. It is very user friendly as you can complete or part complete sections and come back to them and even edit before the final submission. A useful user question section is also provided at each step.

I have always enjoyed the smooth experience of submitting planning applications using the Planning Portal but finding the gradual and severe increase in their additional fees unfair and basically greedy!
I always now submit directly with the Local Authority if their allow so.
The fact that the LAs have increased their own fees unreasonable at the same time doesn’t help justifying the cost of submission.
I am aware the PP have increased their scope of services but they should see the recovery of their costs in setting up these extras by implementing a separate fee schedule separate to the price of submitting planning applications.

Found the process straight forward and it was completed very quickly

The portal is helpful, but for small applications like mine (a simple prior approval process for solar panels in a National Landscape) the administration fee of £85 is way too much. There should be a sliding scale of administration fees to reflect the complexity of the application.
Also, the LPA never close out the application on the portal (I have 2 that have been submitted to my LPA) and they just say "Received by LPA". Both these applications have received written approval from the LPA (years and months ago), so why aren't these applications updated accordingly on my Planning Portal account pages??

Ability to contact people prior to submission was very helpful.
Submission and tracking of the application was very involved and not always easy, more at the time help would really be beneficial

We've used the portal a few times for guidance as to if planning permission is required. We've also used for making a planning application, however, on using the pre booked advise service, charged per half hour, we were given inaccurate information and your own planning officers were unaware of this advise service when they visited our property to discuss work on our property. Perhaps internal training is required when rolling something like this out.

Good service

Planning Portal is essential if you submit planning applications regularly. If you get stuck, the staff are very helpful.