Raised deck area - planning permission?!?!

WATTY1978

Hi
i wonder if anyone has any advice please.
We are in the process of selling our house and the buyers solicitor has raised a question about an area of decking in our garden and whether it has planning permission.
the area is in a corner and about 2m x 2m at its widest / longest point. the front of the deck is 30 - 35cm above grass level but it was put there after wedug down to creat the grassed area. the whole garden had been raisedwhen we bought the house so we dug out the area in front of the house to grass it. the back corner was left raised and uneven so we covered it up with some nice decking instead of digging it all out.
This was all done back in 2007-08. It does not overlook anyone and the ground under neath it it probably varies between 10 - 20 cm below it. its just at the front it is just above 30cm.
what is the best way to respond to the solicitors question? Did i need planning permission back then?
Thanks in advance

Camdoon

Tell them you have no planning consent, are unaware that consent would be required in 2006 and that you will dig it up if required by the pospective owner.

antrobus

Putting up decking, or other raised platforms, in your garden is permitted development, not needing an application for planning permission, providing:

• The decking is no more than 30cm above the ground
• together with other extensions, outbuildings etc, the decking or platforms cover no more than 50 per cent of the garden area.

http://www.planningportal.gov.uk/permission/commonprojects/decking/

On the assumption that OP is in England, it would appear that since "the front of the deck is 30 - 35cm above grass level" then PP would now be required. Presumably it was the same in 2006. Refer the issue to your own solicitor.

julieb1987

We've just bought a place with raised decking and there were no questions asked (as far as I'm aware) about planning permission.

Soot2006

If it is "on average" 20cm above ground you should be OK .

WATTY1978

Thanks for the comments. i'll just tell them what i told you i guess and the worst they can do is ask for it removing. i doubt the buyers are even aware their solicitor has asked. cheers

Better_Days

My buyers solicitor also queried the raised decking in the garden. They were worried that that it covered more than 50% of the garden (taking into account other outbuildings etc). My solicitor reassured them, as she said she could see from the photo's on RM this wouldn't be an issue. I took the view that there are much worse things for solicitors to get their knickers in a twist about, and considered myself lucky that there wasn't anything which would be more difficult to rectify queried. Perhaps raised decking is on a solicitors check list or the issue has been discussed in a 'legal' magazine or the like recently.

tim123456789

antrobus wrote: »

On the assumption that OP is in England, it would appear that since "the front of the deck is 30 - 35cm above grass level" then PP would now be required. Presumably it was the same in 2006. Refer the issue to your own solicitor.

On chceking the date is 1st Octover 2008 so this deck pre-dates the need for planning

tim

martindow

If the height is still an issue a few centimetres of soil would remove the problem.

planning_officer

Unfortunately there's some dud advice above. The 30cm limit on raised platforms came into effect on 1 October 2008, so that's not relevant. However, that doesn't mean it was ok to erect decking prior to 2008 without planning permission. For planning purposes, before 2008, decking was treated in the same way as an outbuilding (under Class E of the General Permitted Development Order - but don't google Class E as you'll come up with the new set of criteria which came into force in 2008). You need to look at the original Class E criteria of Part 1, Schedule 2 of the GPDO - viewable here: http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/1995/418/made

If the decking complies with those criteria, then it did not need planning permission when erected.

However - feel free to ignore all of what I've just written, as it's all somewhat irrelevant. As the decking has been in situ for four years, even if it did require planning permission, it is now immune from enforcement action and in effect lawful. You could apply for a Lawful Development Certificate to get formal confirmation, but this could take up to 8 weeks and you'd need to gather enough evidence to show it has been there that long. Probably not worth it, so I would just respond to the solicitor by saying that you considered it to be permitted development when first erected, but in any event it is now lawful as it has been in situ for four years.