Cannock Chase District Council expects planning applications to be submitted in a complete and assessable form, supported by all relevant plans, reports and technical information.

The Council will normally determine applications on the basis of the information submitted at validation and will not generally seek or accept amendments after validation. Applicants are therefore strongly encouraged to use the Council’s pre-application advice service before submitting an application, particularly for major, complex or sensitive proposals.

The Council will not accept unsolicited amendments. Revised plans or additional information should not be submitted in response to objections, consultee comments or officer concerns unless specifically requested by the planning case officer.

Amendments will only normally be accepted where the proposal is broadly acceptable in principle, the change is not significant, the amendment is necessary to complete the assessment or improve the scheme and no significant / full re-consultation is required.  Amendments would need to be accompanied by an Extension of Time agreement to ensure the application is still determined within the given time period. Only one opportunity to amend will normally be provided.

The processing of amendments and additional work beyond the standard determination process constitute a discretionary activity and as such a charging schedule has been set up to allow the Council to process amendments. The charges will be applied on a cost recovery basis only and will not exceed the cost of providing the service. The fees will be implemented from 1st September 2026 as follows:
 

Householder/LDC/Advert - £75

Minors (including Change Of Use) - £100

Majors - £250 per amendment

The Council will not normally accept amendments where the proposal is fundamentally unacceptable, where significant redesign is required, where a materially different proposal would result, or where a fresh consultation exercise would be necessary. In such cases, the application may be refused or the applicant may be advised to withdraw and submit a revised application following pre-application advice.

Policy on accepting amendments/additional information to planning applications

The Council will exercise its discretion whether to request or accept amendments to a planning application under consideration.  Upon receipt of an application, we expect it to be:

• supported by relevant information and
• in a condition to be fully assessed and determined as submitted.

On that basis our normal position is not to seek or accept amendments after validation.  We encourage applicants to engage in our pre-application service which would assist in the submission of a full application.

We will not accept unsolicited amendments.  Please do not seek amendments in response to an objection unless first cleared with your planning case officer. We will not accept amendments/additional information for applications where the principal of the proposal is found to be unacceptable.

Unless there are exceptional circumstances, we will only seek an amendment under the following conditions:

1. Further analysis of the case means more information or clarification is needed.  It must be needed to complete the assessment of the scheme.  For example, cross sectional or levels details drawings;
2. Amendments of a minor nature that would improve the scheme.  This must be a necessary improvement and not jeopardise a decision within the statutory period. For example, requiring additional consultation or more detailed third party expert advice.

This means we will not generally accept amendments to planning applications if/for:

1. they trigger the need for a fresh 21-day consultation (assessed on an individual basis)
2. an increase in size of or material change to the red edge site boundary unless requested by the LPA
3. a significant move or relocation of footprint and/or volume and mass of built form
4. introduction of materially different uses
5. materially increase the visual impact of the development
6. exacerbate concerns raised by third parties.
7. Please note that this is not an exhaustive list.