The single most common confusion in domestic building work: planning permission and Building Regulations approval are different systems, granted by different people, for different reasons - and having one says nothing about the other.
Planning permission: may you build it?
Planning is about the development's impact on its surroundings - size, appearance, neighbours, use of land, conservation context. Many home projects avoid needing planning permission entirely under permitted development rights (subject to limits and conditions), and some need it because of where the property is rather than what the work is.
Building Regulations: how must it be built?
Building Regulations set construction standards - structure, fire safety, insulation, ventilation, drainage, access. They apply to the work itself, so an extension that's permitted development still needs full Building Regulations approval, structural calculations included. Compliance is checked by Building Control (local authority or a registered approver) through plan checks and site inspections, ending in a completion certificate you'll need when you sell.
The traps we see
- 'The council approved it' - planning approval mistaken for Building Regulations approval; the work still gets inspected and can still fail
- 'It's permitted development so I don't need anything' - no planning application, perhaps, but Building Regulations still apply in full
- Buying a house with unapproved altered structure - no completion certificate, which surfaces in conveyancing and becomes the buyer's leverage
- A builder 'handling the building notice' on structural work - without an engineer's design, problems surface on site where they're most expensive
Where we fit: Paddick produces the Building Regulations packages - drawings, structural calculations, specifications - and deals with Building Control to approval. If your project also needs planning drawings, we work alongside your architect or designer so the two applications tell the same story.