Is there a % of architect and builders fees refunded if planning is refused?

[airborne]

My cousin has just had planning permission refused for an extension she wanted. The rough estimate for the extension was £17 - £22K. I have been helping her out in contacting the builder and architect as she is very young and has no experience in this. Please note I have no experience in this field either but am (a bit!) older and wiser. Anyhow, she (without my knowledge) went ahead and paid the builders (who deal directly with architect) £2.5k to 'get the ball rolling' with applying for planning permission and drawing plans etc. I was quite at this amount and thought it would be at least half that. I figured the amount was high as it was generally thought that permission would be granted as it had been a number of years before. Over all the builder has not been very communicative regarding sending her revised plans and answering questions from neighbours etc and ignored lots of her emails until she really pestered him - She only found out planning was refused today because a firm scouting for business contacted her saying they were able to fight the planning decision! She has not received an official letter from the council or from her builder/architect (although I understand this is public knowledge and its on the council website).

I will be seeing her tomorrow and she is going to bring all the paperwork / emails between her and the builder for me to look at and see what she has signed.

Now planning permission has been refused will she get back some of this £2.5k she paid the builder?

I know all will be revealed soon but I would rather make contact with the builder with some knowledge and possibly ammunition. For the record the builder came highly recommended from 2 sources so I am hanging on to hope that he is decent and she will be entitled to some of the money back. Thanks for any advice.

is it a builder she has paid the money to or the architect? fees pre-planning should only be to the architect, surely. why has the builder been paid?

In any case the answer is that it entirely depends on the contract she agreed with whoever she paid the money to. Presumably if we are talking about the architect there will be design work and submission to planning that they have done that they will need to be paid for.

The builder will have paid the architect fees for drawing up plans and will probably expect a fee for making the planning application. £2500 would be (extremely) steep for this. What does your cousin think this payment was meant to cover?

Here you get the council round first and they advise if you are likely to get planning and what any restrictions would be. You then get an architect to draw up rough plans- plans without details drainage or structural stuff.

You submit these. When you get planning you then have to get more detailed plans that the builder can actually build from and a structural engineer needs to do technical specifications (often most expensive part)

It really depends on what the contract says. It should be in the contract on the fee being refunded then it should without much fuss be returned if nothing was in the contract, well she's just have to put it down to experince.
The only person she can sue is the architect as he is how has is supposed to act on the best intrest of the client and deal with builders.

Thanks, freshmint - she paid the money to the builder (I will know tomorrow precisely who cheque was made out to). She has had no dealing with the architect directly at all, she initially got the builder to view property to give rough estimate and they use their architect to deal with planning and report back via the builder. (Didn't think this was unusual as its the way the 2 recommendations said he worked). Its my guess that they asked high sum because they reckoned it would go through quickly and easily because it had received permission before and he wanted to get cracking on it. I really hope its in the contract, although cousin says 'its not a contract, its a receipt', so God knows what she paid for. I am v scared they have taken advantage of her as she is young and persuaded her out of the £. I guess all will be revealed tomorrow. I would imagine that any change of money would have to have terms attached to it so lets hope its more than a receipt.

The fees sound very high for a project of that size. I don't understand how an architect could draw plans without visiting the site.

I think she should speak to the council about why plans were refused. She needs to establish why consent wasn't straightforward - it could be something as stupid as the plans not being done to the correct scale. She should try and get the money back from the builder (but I think that will be very difficult - sorry) - she needs to ask how the fees were calculated and ask for a meeting with him and the architect (she should also ask to see the architect's qualifications and make sure that she is actually paying for an architect and not some mate of the builder who has CAD software).

She should definitely find another builder and architect if she plans to try and get permission a second time.