Terms of service

These are the terms on which AnnexeCert (“AnnexeCert”, “we”, “us”) provides its services. They apply when you instruct us. Using this website does not by itself create a contract, and the eligibility assessment is free and carries no obligation on either side.

We will send you a written engagement before starting chargeable work. Where anything in that engagement differs from these terms, the engagement applies.

We prepare and submit applications to local planning authorities for lawful development certificates relating to garden annexes, and we conduct the application through to the authority’s decision. The full scope is set out on our what’s included page and in your engagement letter.

We are planning consultants. We do not provide legal advice, and nothing we produce is a substitute for advice from a solicitor where a question of property law, title or contract arises.

The local planning authority decides your application. We do not, and no one acting for you can guarantee that a certificate will be granted.

Our fee is for the preparation and conduct of the application, not for the decision. It is earned when the work is done, whatever the authority determines. If at any point we believe an application is unlikely to succeed, we will tell you and explain why, so that you can decide whether to proceed, change the proposal or stop.

An application is a statement of fact to a public authority, and it is made on the strength of what you tell us. You are responsible for the accuracy and completeness of the information and documents you provide, including your description of the property, the proposed position and how the annexe will be occupied.

You must tell us promptly if anything you have told us changes, or turns out to be wrong, before the application is determined.

We may decline to act, or stop acting, where we are asked to submit something we believe to be inaccurate or misleading. We will explain why, and we will invoice only for work properly done up to that point.

Our managed application service is a fixed fee of £595, confirmed in writing before you instruct us. The council’s application fee is paid directly to the council. We set the payment up for you, so you just log in and pay. For a certificate of this kind it is half the normal planning fee, and we confirm the exact figure for your council before you commit. Prices are confirmed in writing before instruction, including any VAT that applies.

A deposit is payable on instruction and the balance before the application is submitted. Where work outside the agreed scope becomes necessary, we will quote for it separately and will not begin it until you have agreed.

The local planning authority’s statutory application fee is separate from our fee and is payable to the authority. So are the costs of anything listed as excluded from the service, including bespoke surveys and specialist evidence.

Invoices are payable within fourteen days unless the engagement letter says otherwise.

Where you are a consumer and instruct us at a distance, you have a statutory right to cancel within fourteen days of entering into the contract, without giving a reason.

If you ask us to begin work within that period — which most clients do, because it is what gets the application moving — and then cancel, you remain liable for the value of the work carried out up to the point you told us, and for any disbursement we have already incurred on your behalf, such as licensed mapping or an authority fee already paid.

Once an application has been submitted to the authority, it cannot be uncancelled: our fee for preparation and submission has been earned, and any fee paid to the authority is not recoverable from us.

You may end the engagement at any time by telling us in writing. We may end it where you ask us to act improperly, where an invoice remains unpaid after we have asked for it, or where we cannot obtain the information we need to do the work properly.

You may use the plans, statements and other documents we prepare for the purposes of your application and your property. Copyright in them remains ours.

Ordnance Survey mapping supplied as part of an application is licensed for that purpose. It may not be copied, reused for another site, or passed to a third party for their own use, and the licence terms are printed on the drawings.

Technical evidence supplied by a manufacturer remains theirs. We use it for your application with their agreement.

We will carry out the work with reasonable care and skill. If we get something wrong, tell us and we will put it right where we can.

Our total liability arising out of or in connection with the engagement is limited to the fees you have paid us for it, except where the law does not allow such a limit. We are not liable for the authority’s decision, for delay by the authority, for the accuracy of information you or a third party has supplied to us, or for loss of profit, loss of opportunity or other indirect loss.

Nothing in these terms limits our liability for death or personal injury caused by negligence, for fraud, or for anything else that may not lawfully be limited. If you are a consumer, your statutory rights are unaffected.

If something has gone wrong, please tell us. Our complaints procedure sets out how we handle it and how long we take.

These terms are governed by the law of England and Wales, and the courts of England and Wales have exclusive jurisdiction.

Questions about these terms can be sent to planning@annexecert.co.uk.