1st April 2020 looming large.... so not long now until the new unitary council, called Buckinghamshire Council, will become the authority responsible for Local Authority Building Control Services for residents of Aylesbury Vale, Chiltern, South Bucks and Wycombe.
But what does this mean? We are being assured by the 'old' district councils that, in terms of the delivery of the Building Control service, nothing much will change. The same Building Control Officers will remain in the same offices and will cover the same areas as before. So PBSC's Full Plans applications submitted on behalf of our Clients, for their extensions, loft conversions and garage conversions, will still be checked and approved exactly as before. Similarly with site inspections, the Building Control Officers who will be attending for site inspections should remain pretty much the same.
Of course the requirments laid down for meeting Building Regulations are national standards, and so are not affected at all either. In the main we will therefore continue to design in accordance with the Approved Documents (or where applicable, reaching other approval agreements), just as we have always done.
So far, all looks to be a smooth road ahead!!
One change, which harmonises the application process across the region now, is the standardisation of Building Control fees - the charges will now be the same across all four of the previous district areas. Coming into effect from 1st April, you can find through this link the published charges that will now apply to all the council partnership agreements https://www.chiltern.gov.uk/fees20
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