Permanent access to my loft?

pearLondon

Hi 
we live in a block of flats and all top floor flats have a loft which came furnished as a proper room (carpet, windows, plastered walls etc) but access via loft ladder from the corridor. We would like to put a permanent ladder from our living room instead. Rang the planning office in our council and they gave us building reg number. Left messages and no one is coming back to us. Does anyone know if we will need any kind of permission to do that? 

Any help is very appreciated.

Browntoa

Yes , modern loft conversion rules are looking for fire doors , alarms , emergency escape routes . So planning permission

Suspect all the loft ladder access ones are not legal

DevilDamo

How was this room advertised or marketed when you purchased the flat? In other words, was it stated as a glorified storage area/room or was counted as an additional room?

TELLIT01

You will probably require permission from the freeholder in order to carry out any building alterations.

Homer_home

Browntoa said:

Yes , modern loft conversion rules are looking for fire doors , alarms , emergency escape routes . So planning permission

Suspect all the loft ladder access ones are not legal

They are perfectly legal as long as the room is not classified as a bedroom etc 

Are you saying that every loft accessed by a loft ladder is illegal?

Homer_home

Op do you want to move the loft ladder from the corridor to the living room?

What do you mean by permanent ladder?

Do you own the freehold?

If not what does the leasehold say about making alterations ?

You only need planning permission if you plan to use the room as a bedroom or other living area and therefore would need to put a staircase in

If you just plan to use the room as "storage" and just want to move the loft hatch then there is no issues

Jumblebumble

Homer_home said:

Op do you want to move the loft ladder from the corridor to the living room?

What do you mean by permanent ladder?

Do you own the freehold?

If not what does the leasehold say about making alterations ?

You only need planning permission if you plan to use the room as a bedroom or other living area and therefore would need to put a staircase in

If you just plan to use the room as "storage" and just want to move the loft hatch then there is no issues

I suspect  we are confusing planning permission with building control
I believe the council planning dept will be completly disinterested in the OPs project.