Pre-application advice and Planning Performance Agreements

Pre-application advice

If you want to check if you are likely to get Planning Permission before you formally submit your application to us, you can apply for pre-application advice.

Pre-application advice can help speed up the planning process as any potential problems can be highlighted before you submit an application.

Advice will be given by a Planning Officer. Pre-Planning advice cannot guarantee that a Planning Application will be approved. This is because the Planning Office may not be aware of all issues at this stage, and won’t be able to consider any comments or responses that are made once an application has taken place.

Planning Performance Agreement (PPA)

A planning performance agreement (PPA) is an optional project management tool that local planning authorities and applicants can use to agree the process for handling a planning application (for example, agreeing timescales, actions, and resources).

PPAs provide a flexible framework that can be particularly useful for determining an efficient, transparent, and collaborative process for large and/or complex proposals.

A PPA is agreed voluntarily between us and the applicant prior to the application being submitted, and should cover pre-application and application stages but can also be extended to cover post-application stage.

Note, pre-application planning advice and PPAs are offered as optional services within the City Council. This service is there to support applicants as they go through the planning process but it is not a mandatory requirement.

View more information about pre-application advice and PPAs

Page last updated: 11 March 2024