Planning pre-application services

The PPA service provides:

• a comprehensive and personalised service that provides detailed written advice
• advice on the design and feasibility of work involved
• advice on supporting documentation to provide with your application
• a structured timetable and negotiated solutions that are agreed by all parties

The PPA service can help to improve overall quality of your development.

Who can use the service

The PPA is designed for the largest development proposals that are likely to raise a number of issues. These include the following development types:

• provision of 25 or more dwellings
• provision of 25 or more dwellings across more than one site
• development of tall buildings that exceed the London Mayoral referral threshold
• provision of over 10,000 square metres of commercial space
• change of use of over 10,000 square metres of floorspace
• development of a site more than 2.5 hectares
• reserved matters pursuant to outline planning permissions relating to large scale major development
• other bespoke arrangements that are not covered by the services set out in customer advice note 1

If your proposal is already at an advanced stage

Depending on the scale and complexity of your proposal, we recommend you have a pre-application meeting rather than a PPA.

If your proposal involves flood and water management

You'll need to arrange a discussion with the Lead Local Flood Authority (LLFA).

What to expect from PPA

The PPA process will involve a number of meetings, managed by a planning officer and a Place Review conducted by Croydon's Design Review panel.

The whole process involves:

• in-depth research
• consultation with statutory and non-statutory bodies
• presentations to our Planning Committee
• community engagement, this organised by the developer's team

Before your first meeting

You'll have an initial inception, which will seek to agree how the pre-application engagement between you and the planning committee will run.

For this initial inception, you'll need to provide:

• details of the site location on an Ordnance Survey Map
• a description of the development
• a completed pre-application request form
• initial conceptual idea
• your approach to the design and policy compliance, for example, sustainability credentials

Planning Performance Agreements (PPA)

You'll also agree on PPA terms and general pre-application timeframes and deadlines.

This includes:

• how much you'll need to pay towards a dedicated planning case officer support
• any independent consultancy service that you may need at the pre-application stage

Complete the form and pay the fee

Complete the pre-application form (DOC, 82KB) and make sure you tick 'Service Level H: Planning performance agreement (PPA)' on the form.

For information on fees, please download our pre-application advice customer advice note (PDF, 438KB).

Email your request

You can send your application and supporting documents to development.management@croydon.gov.uk.

We will contact you to pay the fee once we've received your application. We will not validate the request until the fee has been paid upfront.

There are a number of ways you can pay the fee.