Planning decisions in Ashford

How long Ashford takes to decide a planning application and how many it approves, from the 974 decisions it made in the twelve months to September 2026. Days run from validation to decision, the clock the council reports against; the wait from receipt is shown beside it. How the figures are made.

63 daysmedian from validation to decision (UK 54)
43%decided within eight weeks (UK 66%), 72% within thirteen
91%approved (UK 90%): 833 approved, 79 refused, 62 withdrawn
207 of 339UK rank for speed, down 63 places on last year; 164 of 339 for approvals
05691 October 2025: 53 days, 162 decisionsOctNovember 2025: 59 days, 177 decisionsNovDecember 2025: 55 days, 160 decisionsDecJanuary 2026: 63 days, 124 decisionsJanFebruary 2026: 73 days, 89 decisionsFebMarch 2026: 112 days, 70 decisionsMarApril 2026: 150 days, 10 decisionsAprMay 2026: 569 days, 1 decisionsMay
Median days from validation to decision, by month of decision. Dashed line: UK median (54 days). Grid at 56 and 91 days, the eight and thirteen week targets.

Delegated or committee

RouteShareMedian daysApprovedDecisions
Delegated to officers99%91%1,875
Planning committee1%100%20

Where the register states how the decision was made.

By year

Year decidedMedian daysWithin 8 weeksApprovedDecisions
2016 *6836%97%153
2017 *5269%85%247
2018 *9914%95%152
2019 *6042%100%36
2020 *3273%89%149
2021 *6442%85%175
2022 *4182%99%105
2023 *12114%89%166
2024 *7431%83%164
2025 *4576%84%240
2026 so far91%1,409

* Years from our archive, which carries no validation date: timed from receipt, so a few days longer than the live years above them.

Past their target date now

Decided in the last three weeks

Built nightly from Ashford's planning register. Ranks are among the 339 published councils. See planning applications in Ashford, appeals, or get alerts for Ashford.

About these figures

How are decision times measured?
Days from the date the council validated the application to the date it decided it, for applications approved or refused in the window. That is the clock councils report against and the official statistics use. Each council’s page also shows the count from receipt, which is what the applicant actually waited. Withdrawn and undecided applications are not timed.
Why do these figures differ from the council’s own?
Councils count an agreed extension of time as decided on time; we treat the calendar as the calendar. Our figures are also live and rolling, where official statistics are quarterly and annual. So a council’s own within-eight-weeks figure will usually sit a little above ours.
What counts as approved?
Approval rate is approvals divided by approvals plus refusals. Withdrawals, and decisions whose outcome the register does not state, are counted in the totals but not in the rate.
Why is a council missing?
A council is published when it has at least 25 timed decisions in the window and its register’s decision data passes our consistency checks. Councils that fail are listed with the reason rather than shown with a number that would mislead.
How often is this updated?
Nightly, from the decisions we collect from every council register we monitor. The window is the twelve months to the last complete month.