Cheshire West and Chester Council – Pre-application support for

Good Development Management

Note: This case study is extracted from the Good Development Management

report, published in June 2019 on the PAS website.

householders

Summary

Wanted to…

• Address the disproportionate level of officer time used

on householder applications post submission

• Increase the take up for householder pre-application

advice

Action

• Remove charges for pre-application advice to

householders

Benefits

• Encourages applicants to work with officers from an

earlier stage

• Provides an opportunity to higher quality schemes that

are more likely to gain approval

• Reduced the delays and costs associated with validation

issues

Learning / risks

• Cost/ benefit analysis showed the initiative to be

beneficial, despite it seeming counterintuitive

• It requires frontloading work, but this is generally offset

by avoiding time that would normally be spent after

submission on bringing the scheme up to standard

Introduction

Cheshire West and Chester Council

found that a disproportionate amount

of resource is used on householder

applications post submission to ensure

that they meet validation requirements;

contributing to an already strained

workload. This presents challenges to

quality and delivery as the fee charged

for householder application does not

come close to reflecting the time that

can be spent on them.

Previously, householder pre-

application advice was charged for, the

take up was low and a high proportion

of applications were invalid or refused.

Applicants are generally reluctant to

change their scheme following

submission.

What they did

To address this, Cheshire West and

Chester have stopped charging for

pre-application advice on householder

applications. The objective is to

encourage applicants to work with

officers from an earlier stage, before

they are too advanced in their

proposals. This early engagement also

gives a stronger ‘quality of service’

message to applicants.

Good Development Management

The new approach gives the service

an opportunity to work with the

applicant to create a higher quality

scheme that is more likely to gain

approval. The greater take up of the

‘free’ pre-application service has also

reduced the delays and costs

associated with validation issues. It

requires frontloading work, but this is

generally offset by avoiding time that

would normally be spent after

submission on bringing the scheme up

to standard. In addition, the

frontloading is likely to be more

effective in improving quality as

applicants are generally less resistant

to making changes pre-submission

(before they have paid the application

fees and submitted final drawings etc.)

Results and Learning

Before removing the charge, a

cost/benefit analysis was undertaken

to compare the money received from

the householder pre-application fees

and the cost of work involved in

resolving issues with householder

applications. As the pre-application

uptake was low, the money received

from the fees does not cover the

additional work often needed.

Removing the charge for pre-

application advice seems

counterintuitive in the current funding

context and the team acknowledged

difficulties in convincing those higher

up in the Council to provide a service

free of charge. This will be a

discussion that continues as the

approach is kept under review. Up-to-

date evidence on the types of

applications coming in and the

processing time helps to decipher the

real benefits of providing (or indeed

not providing) the service, which can

be used to explain to others in the

organisation to get them on board.

For now, in Cheshire West and

Chester, the evidence suggests that

this is working. The approach is

delivering better schemes more aligned

with the Council’s objectives and is

helping the Council to forge better

relationships with its customers.