HBBC: “New Planning Team Heralds a Speedier Service”

RESIDENTS of Hinckley and Bosworth are benefitting from a speedier planning application process after a new director and head of planning have joined the council’s planning department.

After a slower process over the past couple of years, partly due to the pandemic and recruitment issues, new members of staff have joined existing planning officers to improve the customer focus and response.

As a result, residents will have seen an improvement in the responses and updates to their queries, while the speed of processing applications has also increased significantly since summer 2022.

Applications are now being dealt with quicker and the number of applications has reduced from a high of more than 500 live applications in summer 2022 to 304 pending consideration in March 2023. A further new round of recruitment is expected shortly, meaning the process will become even more efficient.