Banks, building societies and post offices in a parade

The bank use class in a parade is Class E, and so is the building society next door and the post office three units along. Financial and professional services moved into the new commercial, business and service class when the Use Classes Order was amended in 2020, and post offices had been in the old shops class before that, which also folded into Class E. The practical result is that a closed branch can be reoccupied as a shop, a cafe, a gym, a nursery, a clinic or an office without any planning application at all. What still needs consent is almost entirely about the frontage and the external alterations.

Where financial and professional services now sit

Class E includes financial services and professional services other than health or medical services, alongside retail, food and drink consumed mostly on the premises, indoor sport and fitness, medical and health services, creches and day nurseries, and offices, research and light industry.

Two categories were deliberately left outside. Betting offices and pay day loan shops, which used to sit with banks in the old financial and professional services class, are now sui generis, so a change to either of those needs permission. So does a drinking establishment or a hot food takeaway, as our note on hot food takeaway as a sui generis use explains.

Before relying on any of this, check two things. A condition on an earlier permission limiting the unit to a named use overrides the class, and an Article 4 direction can remove permitted development rights in the parade. Both are on the authority's online planning register.

Post offices and counters inside other shops

A standalone post office is a Class E use. A post office counter operating inside a newsagent, a convenience store or a village shop is normally part of that shop's use rather than a separate planning unit, because it is ancillary in scale and character to the retail operation.

That distinction matters when a community loses its branch and a shop takes on the service. No application is needed to add a counter to an existing shop. What may be needed is permission for any external alteration, for a new sign, or for changes to access, and the accessibility of the counter position is a matter the authority will comment on even where it cannot control it.

Where the arrangement reverses, and a former post office becomes a shop with a residential flat above created out of the sorting space, the description of development has to carry both parts, and getting a mixed use described correctly on the application form saves an argument later.

What still needs permission

The list is short and it is where the work actually is:

• Change to a use outside Class E: a drinking establishment, a hot food takeaway, a betting office, a pay day loan shop, a place of worship or a community hall
• Change to residential, which is either a full application or prior approval under Class MA
• External alterations affecting appearance: shopfront replacement, new openings, plant, flues, air conditioning, roof alterations
• Advertisements, which are controlled separately under the advertisement regulations
• Anything to a listed building affecting its character, inside or out

Class MA prior approval is the route most often used on a closed branch. The conditions include that the building has been in a Class E use for a continuous period of at least two years before the application, that it has been vacant for at least three continuous months, and that the floor space changing use does not exceed 1,500 m². Several authorities have made Article 4 directions removing Class MA in town centres, so check that first. The detail is in our note on Class MA commercial to residential prior approval.

Cash machines and external alterations

A through-the-wall cash machine is an alteration to the building and normally needs planning permission where it materially affects external appearance, which a new opening in a shopfront does. On a listed building it needs listed building consent, and an opening cut into a stone frontage will be resisted.

The lit surround and any signage are controlled under the advertisement regulations as a separate consent, with the usual considerations of amenity and public safety. Two practical issues come up repeatedly: queuing space on a narrow footway, where people waiting obstruct the pedestrian route, and lighting spilling into flats above the unit.

Where the machine is removed, the opening has to be made good in a way that reads properly. A blanked panel in a stone pilaster is the kind of detail a conservation officer will ask to be corrected, and it costs less to agree the reinstatement detail at the time than to argue about it later.

Security shutters and shopfront design

Former branch frontages present a particular problem for active frontage policies. Banks were designed to look secure, which means high cills, deep reveals, narrow openings and sometimes a largely solid stone or granite elevation. A policy asking for an active, glazed, engaging shopfront is asking for the opposite of what the building was built to be.

The arguments that work are about activity rather than about glazing percentages. A cafe that puts tables inside the window and light behind the glass animates a deep reveal better than a wider opening would. A clinic with a translucent film and a bright interior reads better than blanked vinyl. Where a new opening cannot be avoided, a case built on the original composition of the elevation, with the cill lowered within an existing bay rather than a new hole punched in solid masonry, tends to succeed.

Solid external roller shutters normally need permission and are routinely refused on protected frontages and in conservation areas. Open-grille shutters set behind the glass line are the standard compromise, and internal collapsible grilles better still.

Converting out of a former bank

Branch buildings are awkward to reuse and the awkwardness is physical:

1. Vaults and strongrooms with reinforced concrete walls and steel doors, which are expensive to remove and sometimes structural
2. Deep plan ground floors with daylight only at the front, which constrains residential and clinical uses
3. Floor loading designed for safes and filing rather than for assembly or plant
4. Basements with poor headroom, damp and often asbestos in services and finishes
5. Upper floors reached only through the ground floor, which prevents independent residential use without a new entrance
6. An ATM lobby that occupies the best part of the frontage

Survey before committing. A structural appraisal and an asbestos survey at the point of offer changes the price, and a Structural Survey will identify whether the vault walls can come out at all. Where the upper floors are to be brought into use, the new entrance is usually the item that needs planning permission and the item that determines whether the scheme works.

Illustrative example: a former branch of about 210 m² on a secondary parade, reoccupied as a dental practice within Class E with no change of use application, requiring permission only for a replacement shopfront within the existing opening, a rear extract terminal and two signs. Details here are illustrative only.

Frontage policies in a parade

Local plans protect primary shopping frontages by resisting non-retail uses at ground floor, often with a maximum proportion of non-retail frontage in a defined length. Since Class E permits free movement between retail and services, those policies bite only where a condition, an Article 4 direction or a genuine change out of Class E is involved.

That leaves authorities relying on design control and on the uses that remain outside the class. It also means that arguments about whether a parade is becoming too dominated by one type of occupier are usually arguments about F1 and F2 uses, or about takeaways and drinking establishments, rather than about Class E churn. Where a community use is proposed, the boundary matters, and our note on Class F1 learning and non-residential institutions in practice sets out where that line falls.

Evidence on the existing lawful use

Establish the lawful use before you rely on Class E flexibility. A unit that traded as a bank was in the old financial and professional services class, which sits inside Class E now, so the starting point is usually straightforward. The complications are conditions, mixed uses and long vacancy.

Assemble the planning history, the rating list description, the lease and its permitted user clause, and dated photographs. Where upper floors have been used residentially without permission, or where the ground floor was subdivided at some point, the planning unit may not be what the title suggests. A lawful development certificate for the existing use settles it, and it is worth the fee where a purchase or a fit-out budget depends on the answer.

Browse the PlanScope report library to see which documents a parade reuse project is likely to need.

This is general guidance rather than legal advice. Check the position with your local planning authority or a qualified professional before relying on it. PlanScope provides AI-assisted draft reports for planning applications. Reports should be reviewed before submission. We do not guarantee planning approval.