💡 Submission Timing works best inside your planning journey — open or create your case there and your documents and site data fill this in for you.

🗓 Submission Timing Intelligence

When is the best month — and weekday — to submit your planning application? Real approval-rate + decision-speed data from 144,156 dated decisions across UK LPAs.

📅 Monthly breakdown per LPA 🏆 Best / worst windows ⚡ Decision-speed by month 🌍 National baseline for context
🏛️ By LPA 🗓 Best LPAs by Month
Narrow by type All types Householder Full / Major Outline Reserved Matters Listed Building Conservation Area Prior Approval Lawful Development Change of Use Tree Works / TPO Discharge Conditions Amendment / NMA

📊 Glamorgan

Months below refer to when you submit, not when the decision lands. Each application is bucketed by its received_date month — but the approval rate measures the final outcome, whenever it landed (60-90 days later typically). The lag is already baked into the signal: "submit in December = 100% approval" already accounts for the fact that those decisions arrive in Feb/March. The month-by-month table below shows the lag explicitly so you can see the full cycle.

Best month to submit: August — apps submitted then end up with 100.0% approval (sample: 15 decisions). Avoid submitting in November (84.0% approval).
⚖️ What this council's headline is made of. 34% of its typed decisions are tree consents, condition discharges and amendments — consent administration that approves at 96.3%. On actual development decisions the approval rate is 91% (210 decisions), 5.3 points lower than the mixed figure.
Use the type chips above to filter to the application type you are actually making — and treat cross-council comparisons of the mixed number with care, since the mix depends on which source fed each council.
🏆 Best SUBMIT Month
August
Apps submitted then → 100.0% approval (15 decisions)
⚠️ Avoid SUBMITTING In
November
Apps submitted then → 84.0% approval (25 decisions)
⚡ Submit For Fastest Decision
August
Apps submitted then → avg 54 days to decision
🎯 Inverse view — "I want a decision in [month], when do I submit?"

Based on this LPA's typical decision-lag of 114 days (~4 months), the table below shows when to submit if you want your decision to land in a specific month.

If you want a decision in...Submit by (approx.)That submit month's approval rate
Jan Submit by end of Sep 92.3%
Feb Submit by end of Oct 91.9%
Mar Submit by end of Nov 84%
Apr Submit by end of Dec 100%
May Submit by end of Jan 95%
Jun Submit by end of Feb 97.2%
Jul Submit by end of Mar 96.2%
Aug Submit by end of Apr 84%
Sep Submit by end of May 88.5%
Oct Submit by end of Jun 92.1%
Nov Submit by end of Jul 96.4%
Dec Submit by end of Aug 100%

Inverse calculation is approximate — actual decision time varies (range typically ±30 days). Use the Decision Time Predictor for tighter forecasts.

⏱ Decision speed by application type

How long different application types actually take at Glamorgan. Householder apps are statutorily 8 weeks; full/major are 13 weeks — but the real numbers usually drift. This is what the data says, not what the statute says.
→ Fastest: Amendment / NMA (50 days). Slowest: Heritage / LB (146 days).

Application type Decisions Approval rate Avg days Range
Full / Major 175 90.9% 101 d (14 wk) 35–343 d Filter ▸
Tree Works / TPO 42 95.2% 61 d (9 wk) 9–357 d Filter ▸
Discharge Conditions 33 100% 80 d (11 wk) 3–259 d Filter ▸
Amendment / NMA 33 93.9% 50 d (7 wk) 7–192 d Filter ▸
Advertisement 11 81.8% 125 d (18 wk) 47–260 d Filter ▸
Heritage / LB 8 87.5% 146 d (21 wk) 51–311 d Filter ▸
⏸
Submit-now-or-wait recommendation
WAIT IF YOU CAN
Current month (November) is this LPA's worst — 84% approval. Best (August) is 9 month(s) away at 100%. 16pp uplift available.
Current month's decision speed: ~120 days avg.

📅 Month-by-month breakdown — full submit→decide cycle

Each row shows the complete journey for applications received in that month: how long they took, when the decision actually landed, and what % were approved. The approval rate already accounts for everything that happens between submission and decision — the lag is part of the signal.

Submit month Decisions Approval rate Median lag Decision typically lands in Range
January 20
95%
101d (~14wk) → April 64–217d
February 36
97.2%
98d (~14wk) → May 40–311d
March 26
96.2%
82d (~12wk) → June 14–259d
April 25
84%
106d (~15wk) → August 3–254d
May 26
88.5%
85d (~12wk) → August 50–227d
June 38
92.1%
68d (~10wk) → August 28–182d
July 28
96.4%
62d (~9wk) → September 5–151d
August 15
100%
54d (~8wk) → October —
September 26
92.3%
110d (~16wk) → January 63–343d
October 37
91.9%
55d (~8wk) → December 16–165d
November 25
84%
120d (~17wk) → March 13–260d
December 16
100%
133d (~19wk) → April 7–357d

Read across each row: submit in [month] → wait [median lag] → decision lands in [target month] → outcome [approval rate]. The approval rate is the final outcome of the whole cycle, not a snapshot.

🗓 Day-of-week patterns

Day receivedDecisionsApproval rateAvg days
Monday 79 83.5% 104
Tuesday 73 94.5% 89
Wednesday 56 96.4% 95
Thursday 63 96.8% 84
Friday 56 94.6% 115
⚖️ Why timing matters less than they pretend: A planning decision should be made on its substantive merits, not the season. But officers have queues, committees have schedules, and consultees go on holiday. The data is a guide to operational friction, not policy friction. If your scheme is sound, time it to land in their best window. If it's borderline, give yourself every advantage.
📊 Data sources & freshness

Timing is a tactical edge, not strategic justification. Use alongside the constraint check + pattern fingerprint to make the case strong on substance, then time it to land well.

  • planning_applications.received_date (updated Daily ingest)
    144,156 dated decisions where a submission date and a decision are both known. The submission date is received_date, falling back to validated_date — many council portals publish only the validated date, and the statutory clock runs from it. Approval = approved/granted/permit. Sample size gating: months with fewer than 8 decisions excluded from best/worst recommendation.
  • Day-of-week patterns
    Reflects when applicants choose to submit, which may correlate with applicant type (Monday = professional consultants; Friday = end-of-week DIY submissions). Causality is correlative not causal.
  • Decision-time outliers
    Months showing 200+ day averages are flagged — they reflect older PINS-appeal-derived rows where determinations stretched over many months. Read the Jan/Feb/Nov/Dec numbers (largest samples) as the reliable benchmark.
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