Two different approvals
Planning permission is not a catch-all for every kind of consent. There are two separate systems, run by different teams, and a solid conservatory roof meets both.
Planning decides whether a change to the appearance and use of a property is acceptable. Building Regulations decide whether the work is safe, energy efficient and properly built. A scheme can pass one and need the other, and neither approval stands in for the other.
Planning permission for changing a roof is a question for your local planning authority, which is the district or borough council for the address: Thanet, Canterbury, Dover, Swale, Folkestone & Hythe or, for Wye, Chilham, Challock and Brabourne, Ashford. The council's planning team can say whether your plan is permitted development or needs an application.
Why ask first
Asking early also tells you the right order of events. Building control wants drawings and details of the roof build-up. Getting any planning answer first saves redrawing the roof later.
This page stays general on purpose. The permitted development rules have conditions that depend on the house, and what the council says about your address is the answer to rely on.
Building Regulations always arise for a new solid roof
This is the part that does not vary. The Planning Portal's page on changing a conservatory roof says owners often move from polycarbonate to a solid tiled roof, and that the new roof has to satisfy Building Regulations covering its structure, energy performance and ventilation.
The common exemption for conservatories does not carry over automatically. Its conditions are tested against the particular building, and a solid roof is a new roof, so the approval route has to be settled before work starts.
Your approval comes from a building control body:
- your district council's own team (Thanet's is on 01843 577522)
- the partnership or service your council names on its building control page
- or a registered building control approver, a private route through a firm entered on the Building Safety Regulator's register
Each body works to the same national rules, so the technical answer does not change with the provider; the paperwork and the contact do. The weight of the new roof comes into it too. The guide to conservatory roof Building Regulations explains what is inspected.
Listed homes, conservation areas and flats
Some homes need an extra step, and a conservatory roof is not exempt from it.
| Your home | What changes |
|---|---|
| Listed building | Alterations affecting its character need listed building consent |
| Conservation area | Check with the council, including any Article 4 direction |
| Flat or maisonette | Flats lack permitted development rights, so ask the council |
| Dover district | Dover District Council counts even a like-for-like re-covering as work needing approval |
On the first row, section 7 of the Listed Buildings Act is the source of the consent rule, and Canterbury City Council repeats it for its own district. On the third, Canterbury City Council's planning page states that flats and maisonettes carry no permitted development rights, and anyone altering the outside must apply for planning permission.
Conservation areas are designated by the council and a direction under Article 4 can withdraw rights across an area. Thanet publishes 27 conservation areas, Canterbury 97, Dover 57 and Swale 51. Check whether a direction applies with your own council. The detailed guides are conservatory roofs on listed buildings and in conservation areas.
A short order of questions before you commit
The sequence below keeps the consent steps in the right order, and costs nothing to follow.
- Find out from the district council if the house is listed, lies in a conservation area or sits under an Article 4 direction.
- Ask the planning team whether a solid roof on your conservatory needs an application.
- Have the roof survey done, so the frame and the build-up are known.
- Choose the building control route and submit it with the roof details.
- Fix a start date only when the consents are in place.
Keep every reply from the council in one folder, because a later buyer's solicitor may ask for it. Doing it in this order means no roof is ordered and paid for before anyone has asked the council a question. A solid roof is made to the frame's measurements, so a late change is expensive to reverse.
The conservatory roofs page sets out the whole job, from survey to making good. We describe the roof clearly enough for the council and building control to answer, and keep the paperwork in step with the work on site.
