Planning tool
Do you need to serve a party wall notice?
Get this wrong and a neighbour can stop the job with an injunction after the scaffold is up. Tick everything your work involves and we will tell you which notices apply, how long before the work they have to be served, and what happens if a neighbour does not agree.
What does the work involve?
Tick everything that applies. Most extensions tick two.
The three notices
Section 1
Building a new wall at or astride the boundary Notice describes where the wall will sit and whether it straddles the line. Building wholly on your own land still needs notice if the wall is at the boundary.
1 month Section 2
Work to an existing shared wall Cutting in for beams, removing a chimney breast, raising or underpinning the wall, inserting a damp course, taking down and rebuilding. The commonest one on loft conversions and extensions.
2 months Section 6
Excavating near a neighbour’s building Within 3 m and deeper than their foundations, or within 6 m and below a line drawn down at 45° from the bottom of their foundations. Foundations for an extension usually trigger this.
1 month England and Wales only. The Party Wall etc. Act 1996 does not apply in Scotland or Northern Ireland, where the position is a matter of common law and title deeds. A notice is not planning permission and does not replace it: you can need both, or either on its own.