House for Let
We’ve found that our interactive house is being frequently used by businesses to explain planning information to clients, whether it’s to explain why permission is not required for that bijou little extension or why it is not possible to chop down the ancient oak and build a new house for granny in the garden.
What businesses don’t lke though is using a tool that carries a competitor or other unaffilliated company’s advertising. In response we’ve stripped out the adverts and created a version of the house that can sit on a busineses own website in all it’s naked glory.
We call this “House Share” and for a very small fee it’s yours.
To see this in action visit C & L Windows website.
To begin the process of getting your own house contact our vibrant sales team (Tom and Anne) at sales@planningportal.gsi.gov.uk
Planning Portal Blog 
I cautioned some time ago on the introduction of advertising on government web sites, in particular on the PP site. It seems my scepticism was not that but foresight. The PP are now it seems using the fact of having sold/ selling advertising to sell advertising free versions to those other than the advertiser whom do not want to promote competitors to their own business. In my my opinion this is not a proper way for a public service to operate. Advertising, if the portal cannot survive without it should be clearly stated as that and all in all cases should be qualifed by a disclaimer stating that its presence does not indicate or confer any affiliation endorsement or recommendation with/from the PP or government. Which affiliation/endorsement it is of course that the advertiser wants/tries to portray. At the very least advert free versions should be free to those whom want them. Charging a fee and advertising deters an obviously identified proportion of users, whom would otherwise bring them to the publics attention, not do so. Which, undermines the very purpose of the PP, to inform public and professionals alike.
If the revenue generated from advertising ensures that the Planning Portal continues to operate and thrive saving us the tax payers millions of pounds I for one have no problem with advertising on the site. We need to get real people, times have changed…so must we.
We have the interactive house emdedded on our http://www.swindon.gov.uk/planning/householder
webpage. This is now one of the post popular pages on the Council’s website. I would recommend it to businesses and local authorities as a means of generating more traffic to your websites.
Hi David, really glad it’s working for you.