Wales Planning Fees:

Following consultation and confirmation in June that Planning Application Fees in Wales would be increasing, the draft regulations have now been published.

The Regulations introduce new fees, new development size thresholds for calculating fee sizes in some cases, along with a new regiime where fees are to be set annually via revised “Fee Document” which will be published by Welsh Government. The new fees are expected to be charged where applications are made on and after 01 December 2025.

Aiming to lead to Full Cost Recovery (FCR) in LA Planning Services, some stark increases will be seen: Just 2 common examples:-

  • enlargement, improvement, other alts to existing dwelling from £230 to £585

  • Outline application (dwellings) on 1.3 ha site from £5980 to £14971

In future, fees identified on the FCR pathway will rise by max 10% CPI) each April from 2027 until FCR is reached in 3-5 years. All other fees will increase annually by CPI each April from 2027.

A key frustration with many projects and for clients is managing expectancy around the speeds of decision making and quality of “the service”. So will the increase actually go to fund “better” planning services? We are told Welsh Government exepcts :

planning fees to be reinvested back into planning services. Applicants have consistently indicated a willingness to pay higher fees if this results in a more efficient and reliable planning service. The proposed increases are tied to a commitment to improve LPA performance, capacity, and resilience. The reintroduction of the Planning Performance Framework (PPF) from April 2025 will ensure that LPAs are held accountable for delivering measurable service enhancements.

We strongly hope this soft carrot approach doesn’t backfire on Government and LA’s and that otherwise hard stretched Councils dont hoover the money off into other services.. WG told us that moving to a monitoring approach when disapplying TAN 1/removing the 5 year Housing Land Supply Requirement would better deliver houses in Wales. Thats really worked hasnt it .