Pharmacies: Class E(a) or Class E(e)?

A pharmacy's use class is decided by what the premises are primarily used for, not by the shop sign. A community pharmacy whose floor area and turnover are dominated by the retail sale of medicines, toiletries and general goods falls within Class E(a) of the Town and Country Planning (Use Classes) Order 1987. A unit whose main activity is clinical consultation, vaccination and treatment, with dispensing as a support function, falls within Class E(e) as the provision of medical or health services. Most high street pharmacies sit in the first category.

Since both limbs are inside Class E, movement between them needs no planning permission. That is why people assume the question does not matter. It matters for four reasons, and all of them bite later.

How the classification works

Class E(a) covers the display or retail sale of goods, other than hot food, principally to visiting members of the public. Class E(e) covers the provision of medical or health services, principally to visiting members of the public, except where the premises are attached to the house of the consultant or practitioner.

Before 1 September 2020 a chemist's shop was Class A1 and a doctor's surgery was Class D1, and the boundary was well trodden. The 2020 amendment pulled both into Class E, which removed the need for permission to move between them and simultaneously made the historic classification of any given unit harder to pin down.

The test is primary use, assessed on the facts. Floor area given over to each activity, the proportion of revenue, the number of staff on each side of the counter and the way the unit presents to the street all feed into it. A dispensary at the back of a shop selling shampoo and sun cream is retail. A clinic with a dispensing hatch is not.

The consultation room question

Pharmacy practice has moved substantially towards clinical services, and that shift is where the classification gets interesting. Vaccination, blood pressure checks, contraception services and minor illness consultations all take place in a private consultation room, and a pharmacy with two consultation rooms and a reduced retail floor starts to look like a health use.

There is no bright-line percentage. What I would look at is whether a visitor arriving without an appointment would describe the premises as a shop. If appointments dominate and the retail display is residual, the character has changed.

The change itself needs no permission while the unit stays in Class E. But if you are relying on the premises being a health use, for example to meet a local plan policy protecting health facilities, be ready to evidence it.

Why the distinction matters

Four consequences follow from the primary use, and none of them are about whether you need permission today.

1. Town centre policies. Many adopted local plans protect primary shopping frontages by resisting the loss of retail at ground floor. Those policies are usually drafted around retail character rather than around the statutory class, so a shift from retail to clinical use in a protected frontage can engage the policy even though no permission is required.
2. Protection of health facilities. The reverse applies where a plan protects community and health uses. Losing a health use can engage a policy that a retail use would not.
3. Class MA prior approval. The right to change from commercial to residential use under Part 3 Class MA of the General Permitted Development Order 2015 requires the building to have been in a Class E use for a continuous period before the application, among other conditions. Both limbs qualify, so the pharmacy question rarely decides this, but the evidence of continuous use does.
4. Conditions on earlier permissions. This is the one that catches people.

Conditions that survive the 2020 changes

Where an earlier planning permission carries a condition restricting the use of a unit to a specific former class, that condition continues to have effect. A condition saying the premises "shall be used only as a shop within Class A1 of the Use Classes Order 1987 and for no other purpose" is read against the classes as they stood when the condition was imposed.

The practical effect is severe. A unit with such a condition cannot move freely within Class E, because the condition rather than the Order governs. Changing use then requires an application under section 73 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 to vary the condition, or a fresh application for the new use.

So before you commit to a fit-out, pull the planning history of the unit. Look for conditions tying the use to a class, restricting hours, restricting servicing or removing permitted development rights. Our note on varying an opening hours condition covers the section 73 route in more detail, and the same mechanism applies to a use class condition.

Frontage, access and step-free entry

Pharmacies serve a disproportionate number of people with mobility difficulties, and the frontage is where planning and accessibility meet.

Alterations to a shopfront in a conservation area, or to a listed building, need consent in their own right. A level or ramped threshold often means altering the public footway, which brings in the highway authority under section 184 of the Highways Act 1980 for a crossing or a licence for anything projecting over the highway. Automatic doors swinging outwards over a footway are a frequent refusal point.

Internally, the Equality Act 2010 duty to make reasonable adjustments applies to the service provider regardless of planning, and BS 8300 is the usual design reference. Planning will not police it, but a consultation room that cannot be reached by a wheelchair user is a problem you will have to solve eventually.

Signage is a separate consent. Illuminated fascia signs and projecting signs usually need advertisement consent under the advertisement regulations, and a green cross is not exempt simply because it is a pharmacy symbol.

Clinical waste, controlled drugs and plant

Three operational matters surface in applications and conditions.

Clinical and pharmaceutical waste is subject to the duty of care under Part II of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 and, for hazardous streams, the hazardous waste regime. Planning's interest is in where the bins go, how often they are collected and whether collection can happen without obstructing the highway. A waste storage plan on the submitted drawings answers most of it.

Controlled drugs storage is governed by the misuse of drugs legislation rather than planning, but the cabinet has to go somewhere and the security requirements can drive internal layout.

Air conditioning for the dispensary and consultation rooms is the plant item that generates objections, particularly where there are flats above. External condensers need sound power data and a mounting detail, and in a terrace a noise impact assessment against BS 4142:2014+A1:2019 is what environmental health will expect.

Hours and the contract

A pharmacy's opening hours are driven by its NHS pharmaceutical services arrangements, and those arrangements are made under health legislation that has nothing to do with planning. A planning condition restricting hours does not bend to accommodate them.

That mismatch is worth checking before you take on a unit with a restrictive hours condition, because a contract requiring long opening hours and a condition limiting trading to 9am to 6pm cannot both be satisfied. Resolving it means a section 73 application, consultation with neighbours and a decision that may take eight weeks or longer.

Pull the decision notice. Read every condition. A planning statement addressing the frontage policy and the hours case is usually what a variation application needs, and PlanScope can produce an AI-assisted draft of one structured to UK planning policy.

This is general guidance, not 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.