What tolerance do Planning Departments work too?

[tony1851]

As many comments say, plans should be dimensioned if they are to be built from.
But whether dimensions are shown or not, what does a council do if an extension goes over an accepted limit, eg if what should
be a 3m extension ends up at 3.1m?
The ultimate sanction is enforcement to have the extension removed, so you have to consider the policy guidelines on enforcement issued by the government.
The original guidelines were in PPG 18; these were withdrawn a few years ago but in the absence of more recent guidelines, still carry some weight.
On a breach of planning rules, it simply states: "enforcement may not be appropriate for a minor or technical breach where no harm has occurred". What is regarded by 'minor', or causes no 'harm', will depend on context.

 

[Footsoldier888]

A few years back I got into this exact situation, infact it was this incident that got me interested in planning and building.

It is a bit hard to explain but behind us a lady had put in for a really large side and rear extension on a corner plot, with the rear single storey element facing us. It faced us and next door 50/50 but because of the garden configuration we weren't contacted by the council, which seemed to me unfair. But there were enough objections to take it to committee and there was lengthy reports about visual impact etc etc. But it was passed, which was fine and when I saw the plans it was designed by a good local architect. It was floor to ceiling glass but with a very low roofline and thin frames.

Anyway between then and the build this lady paid for a firm of tree surgeons to reduce a willow in her neighbours back garden and two guys climbed over a six foot fence into our garden without any notice and my dad who was mid 80's got quite distressed over it. It was highly out of order. I'm not even certain if the neighbour had given consent either, the lady was quite odd which is why she got so many objections I think.

So the build took place but when it came to the single storey room I heard they ran into money issues and the lovely design was ditched and instead of the very flat resolution they ended up with a conventional build with about 30m between glass and flat roof. Also the posts between the frames were a lot thicker.

Anyway angered by these 'wrongs' I did report it! I remember on those plans there were no height figures and it took a bit of working out at the time. The EO wrote saying it was de minimis, which was ofcourse correct. However at the time it did feel a bit rigged but I didn't know anything about the complexity of building then. He did however agree it hadn't been built to plan.

As to the OP it is height that produces the most complaints, especially in a 'nice' ie expensive area.

Wessex I like your bungalow post but surely there were planning reasons that governed the approval? Could it be to do with PD rights being close in scale to the proposed plan???