I’m sorry to say that a business based in the north of England is selling advertising in a trade directory in the Manchester region on the basis of a relationship with the Planning Portal.
This is not the first time this has happened and we take this very seriously.
To be clear no-one sells advertising on or for the Portal other than our staff here in Bristol.
If you are approached please let me and your local trading standards office know ASAP.
The planning department of Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council has become the latest local planning authority to go paperless.
Reduced desk and filing space from a recent office move, combined with the ever-present need to make savings led Rotherham to explore greater and more innovative uses of technology to achieve efficiencies.
The implementation of a document management system (DMS) has now drastically changed the way the planning department works within Rotherham. Read more…
In this age of efficiency and austerity I challenge you to describe what the Planning Portal service means to you, your business or planning and building in general in one word only.
I’m delighted to let you know that this Thursday evening we will be rolling out the final part of the current 1APP improvements project.
The Portal will be unavailable between 20:00 and 22:00 on Thursday 20th September.
It’s been a long Summer (and Spring) of system improvements – all based on suggestions and feedback from users, both applicant and LPA. Read more…
I’d like to welcome our new Planning Minister Nick Boles to DCLG and look forward to an early opportunity to spread the Portal message.
Here’s the DCLG ministerial team on the DCLG website.
We have a campaign planned this year in support of channel shift – in other words moving away from traditional routes of engagement with customers (e.g. face-to-face and phone) and using the web instead.
We’re going to be working primarily with local planning authorities on this campaign – stay tuned for more information on campaigns aimed at planning and building professionals.
We’ve got a series of articles planned on how local planning authorities are increasingly becoming paperless to save money and carbon. The first will be with you next week.
The articles will look at related strategies such as increasing use of mobile technologies like smart phones and tablet computers as well as how local authorities are encouraging applicants and customers to switch to online channels.
We’ll also be looking at what really happens in a paperless planning office – and we’ll make sure officers from the local planning authority concerned are on hand to respond to any questions from readers.
Finally, in October we’ll be running an event in Bristol with local authorities to explore how we can improve links and messaging between LPA websites and the Portal (and vice versa) to improve the user experience for our shared customers. If this works well we’ll be looking at the opportunity to run more around the country.
In the meantime, if you work at a local authority which has implemented a channel shift strategy and would like to share your story, please drop us an email or simply post a comment below.
Sorry to be direct. It’s been a while since I polled you to get a view on the range of professions that make up the blog audience.
The last time was back in 2009 when we had a breakdown of users that was split roughly 40 per cent professional applicant, 40 per cent LPA and 20 per cent member of the public.
This time I thought I’d ask the same question except with some more specific professional groupings. Read more…
There are around 2 million free downloads of the Building Regulations Approved Documents from the Portal each year – clearly this is a valued service.
It would help me to understand our service better if you could provide some feedback on what it is you value in our Approved Documents service.
I’d be grateful if you could let me know:
- How you currently use the Approved Documents downloaded from the Portal
- How we could improve or add functionality to the current service
- What your profession is
Many thanks!
For some time now I have used LinkedIn to connect with and keep tabs on my friends and colleagues.
More recently I have begun to use many of the subject or trade specific groups to reach deeper into particular sectors of our community.
By doing so I’m able to ask more targeted questions and get more detailed feedback than I can easily do via this blog.
I’m currently involved in groups for planners, building control, arboriculturalists, architects, surveyors etc.
If you think that there is a community I need to link with or you’d like to connect with me please let me know.
I thought you might like a view of the finely honed athletes that make up Team PP.
As with our all conquering heroes of the Olympics, Team PP are highly dedicated, committed to excellence and never to be found propping up the bars of Bristol (one of those statements is not true).
They are multi-award winning and help make Britain a better place.
This isn’t the entire team, just those that happened to be in the office when the camera came out, but you’ll get the gist.
Heroes one and all!
Planning Portal Blog 