Stage payments and cash flow on a small development

Planning costs on a small development do not arrive evenly. They cluster into four bursts: a heavy one before you apply, a modest one at submission, an unpredictable one during discharge of conditions, and a sharp one in the weeks either side of starting on site. A cash flow built on a single average monthly figure will be wrong in both directions and will run out at the third burst, which is the one that catches most self-builders.

The fix is a spend profile keyed to the programme rather than to the calendar. Once you have it, the question changes from how much this will cost to when each amount has to be in the account.

Mapping spend against the programme

Six stages, and the boundaries between them are where money moves.

Site acquisition and feasibility. Application preparation. Submission and determination. Discharge of conditions. Start on site. Construction and completion.

Write those across the top of a sheet, then put every cost you can think of under the stage at which the invoice actually arrives, not the stage at which the work feels like it belongs. A topographical survey feels like design. The invoice arrives before you have drawn anything.

The discipline matters because planning costs are front loaded and largely unrecoverable. Money spent on surveys before a decision is money spent whether the answer is yes or no.

Before an application is made

This is the largest planning stage in cash terms on most small schemes, and it is the one people underestimate.

The predictable items are the topographical survey, a measured survey of any existing building, feasibility and then detailed design, and constraint searches. On anything other than an infill plot in a clear area you should also expect a preliminary ecological appraisal, an arboricultural survey where trees are near the working area, and infiltration testing for drainage, which needs a suitable ground condition window.

Pre-application advice is a locally priced service. Councils publish their charges in bands, usually by scale of development, and the fee is not refundable if the advice is unwelcome. On a small scheme with an obvious policy question, it is normally worth it. On a plot with an allocation and a straightforward design, it often is not.

Ecology is the item that moves the programme rather than the budget. Survey seasons are fixed and missing one can push a submission by the better part of a year, which costs far more in holding charges than the survey itself.

Submission and determination

The application fee is set nationally and indexed annually with effect from 1 April, so take the current figure from the fee schedule on the day you submit. Add the portal service charge for electronic submission.

Determination is usually a quiet period financially, with two exceptions. Consultee responses can generate requests for further work, most often on highways, drainage or ecology, and that work is unbudgeted by definition. And where an application is going to committee, agents charge for attendance and preparation.

Build a contingency into the determination stage rather than the construction stage. A sum of the order of a further survey and a set of amended drawings is a reasonable starting assumption for a minor application, and if you do not use it, it rolls forward.

Where the scheme needs several documents, the costs of assembling them add up quickly, which is why it is worth knowing early which of the supporting documents your project actually triggers rather than commissioning on advice given late.

Discharge of conditions

The stage that breaks cash flow projections. Two things drive it.

The discharge fee is charged per request rather than per condition, at a fixed national rate with a lower householder rate. Batching conditions into one request costs less.

The evidence behind the conditions is the real cost. A contamination condition needs an investigation and possibly a remediation strategy. An archaeology condition needs a written scheme and then a watching brief or an evaluation. A drainage condition needs a designed scheme with calculations. A biodiversity gain condition needs an approved plan with a habitat management and monitoring plan behind it, secured for 30 years.

None of that is optional and none of it can be done retrospectively, because starting work in breach of a condition precedent can mean the permission was never implemented.

Allow eight weeks per discharge application, and allow for one round of further information. Authorities are entitled to the full statutory period and busy ones use it.

Levy and obligation payments around the start

This is where the numbers get large and the deadlines get hard.

Where the community infrastructure levy applies, the sequence is fixed by regulation and each step has a consequence if missed.

1. The authority issues a liability notice after permission is granted.
2. Someone assumes liability, in writing, before development begins.
3. Any exemption or relief is claimed and determined before development begins. Self-build exemption and the residential extension exemption both work this way.
4. A commencement notice is served before development begins.
5. The authority issues a demand notice, and payment falls due either in instalments under the authority's published instalment policy or, where there is no such policy, in full within 60 days of commencement.

Miss step two, three or four and reliefs can be lost, surcharges applied and the full amount brought forward. Self-builders lose exemptions this way more often than through any dispute about eligibility. The levy calculation from the charging schedule is worth doing at feasibility stage, before the design is fixed, because floorspace decisions drive it.

Section 106 obligations on small schemes are usually financial contributions with triggers at commencement or at first occupation. Read the triggers and put them in the cash flow as dated items, because they are enforceable debts rather than negotiable invoices.

Utility and highway payments

These sit outside the planning fee schedule entirely and they are frequently the largest single planning related payments on a small scheme.

New connections for water, electricity, gas and telecoms each carry a quotation process with its own lead time. Quotations expire. Accepting late means requoting at current prices.

Where a new or altered access onto a public highway is needed, the highway authority will require an agreement under section 278 of the Highways Act 1980, with a design fee, an inspection fee, a bond and the works themselves. The way section 278 costs are built up is worth understanding before you assume a dropped kerb is a small item.

Where new roads or sewers are to be adopted, agreements under section 38 and section 104 bring bonds and commuted sums, and the commuted sum negotiation can move the figure materially.

Building a simple spend profile

One table, six columns, updated monthly.

Two habits make the profile useful rather than decorative. Put a date against every row, taken from the programme, and review the whole sheet whenever the programme moves. And separate committed spend from estimated spend in different colours, so you can see at a glance how much of the next three months is already fixed.

If you want to know which reports your site is likely to need before any of this is committed, you can enter the postcode on PlanScope and work from the resulting list, then price the ones that need a specialist. Our own pricing is one free report, £50 per report, or £150 per month for unlimited reports on the Professional tier.

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.