*** Please note that this site will not be available from 4:30 to 6:30 PM  on Monday 29/4/2024 for maintenance ***

This beta site currently allows electronic applications and submissions to 27 local authorities - see the 'about' page for more information. 

 

What is this notice?

This Privacy Notice relates to the Online Planning Portal operated by LGMA. This notice explains our privacy policy and sets out how we use any personal information submitted to, and retained by, the service.

What is the Online Planning Portal?

The Online Planning Portal service was developed to allow users to make their planning applications electronically through a single Irish-wide portal.

Who is responsible for the service?

The Planning team within the LGMA manage the Online Planning Portal on behalf of all Irish Planning Authorities. The portal servers and databases are maintained by LGMA’s Network Operations Centre (NOC) and their contracted IT providers.

What information is collected by the service?

For people browsing the website, no personal data is collected. However, we do sometimes place small pieces of information stored in simple text files on your computer. These are known as cookies. You can manage and/or delete these small files as you wish. Most websites use cookies to help improve their service by:

  • remembering settings, so you don’t have to re-enter them when visiting a new page
  • remembering information, you’ve given so you don’t need to keep entering it
  • measuring how you use the website, to make sure it meets your needs

To learn more about cookies and how to manage them, visit AboutCookies.org. Or please read on to find out more about how and where we use cookies.

What information do we retain and for how long?

We retain your account details and information that you enter when registering for the service, which includes your name, address, phone number and email address. This information is required for the purpose of considering a valid planning application in accordance with Section 7 of the Planning and Development Act 2000, as amended, Part 4 and Schedule 3 of the Planning and Development Regulations, 2001, as amended, and will continue to for as long as you have an account with the service.

Applications submitted to counties Cork, Dublin and Wexford will be deleted from the portal 2 years after they have been submitted. All other applications submitted will be deleted from the portal database 1 year following the date of finalisation of the application (Finalisation means an application is one of the following; Withdrawn, Deemed Withdrawn, Invalid, Granted or Refused). The retention of submitted applications for this limited period allows users to view their submitted applications, to download them, to enable them to use a recent submission as a template for a new submission (if required).

Any applications that you leave in draft on the portal will contain your personal data. Your draft applications will not be transferred to Planning Authorities, nor will they be accessible to anyone with administrative access to the service.

Your draft applications will be retained in the database until:

  • you unregister from the service,
  • you submit them (where they will be deleted 1 year following finalisation of the application),
  • you delete them from your account, or
  • they are automatically deleted by the service if they have not been accessed in the previous 12 months.

The legal basis for processing information set out in applications between the service and Local and/or Planning Authorities, and the service and DPEA, falls within Article 6(1)(e) of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). This is undertaken as a Public Task.

Will you be contacted by the service?

We will only contact you by email in the following circumstances:

  • You will receive emails from the service when you submit an application to inform you of progress in processing the application and of the final decision.
  • You will receive reminders to update a draft application prior to deletion.

There may be instances where we contact you to advise about upcoming changes to the service, and particularly in the event of changes or service issues that could affect you as a user and affect how you use the service. This includes when we make changes to our Privacy Notice or Terms and Conditions.

What are your rights and responsibilities?

By registering on the Online Planning Portal and making submissions through it to your Planning Authorities, you accept and consent to the Terms and Conditions for the service and the practices set out in this Privacy Notice.

As a user of the service, you can access the information that is held in your registered account and have the ability to update this information at any time by logging in and visiting ‘My Details’.

Can you unregister from the service?

Yes. Should you wish, you can unregister from the service as long as you have no open applications by logging into your account and clicking on a link to unregister. After unregistering, all information held relating to your account, and any draft applications and recent submissions held by the service, will be deleted. If there are live applications/submissions associated with your user account, you will have to wait until the planning process for those files is complete to de-register.

Will documents submitted via the Online Planning Portal be viewable to the public online?

The 31 Planning Authorities are obliged under Section 7 of the Planning and Development Act 2000 to maintain a publicly available register of planning applications on its internet website.

The information obliged under statute to be publicly available within this register is as follows:

  • A copy of the planning application and of any particulars, evidence, other written report study or further information received or obtained by the authority from the applicant in accordance the planning and development regulations 2001.
  • A copy of any submissions or observations in relation to the planning application which have been received by the authority.
  • A copy of any report prepared by or for the authority in relation to the planning application.
  • A copy of the decision of the authority in respect of the planning application and a copy of the notification of the decision given to the applicant.
  • A copy of any documents relating to a contribution or other matter referred to in Section 34 (5) of the planning and development Act 2000.

The register of Planning Applications shall incorporate a map for enabling a person to trace any entry in the register.

The details for all planning applications shall be publicly available for at least seven years after the making of the decision of the planning authority.

Please be fully advised that the planning process in Ireland is open and transparent, with public availability of documents required and public participation encouraged.

What information submitted with a Planning Application will not be published online?

Details of any telephone numbers of the applicant or address for communication with the applicant in electronic form provided by or on behalf of the applicant shall be taken not to be part of the planning application and shall not be made available by a planning authority to members of the public.

It should also be noted that as you upload documents relating to your application, you will be asked to assign a category to each document uploaded. Documents are categorised as either Public or Confidential when they are uploaded. Public documents will be published online whereas Confidential documents will not. It is the responsibility of the applicant to ensure that the correct document category is chosen at the time of uploading the application so as to ensure that only those documents that should be published online are published online and vice versa.

Can my account and my draft applications be deleted by the service?

If you have any applications that are in draft status and these have not been accessed by you in the last 12 months, they will be deleted. We will issue emails on a monthly basis to all users that have not accessed or edited a draft application form in the last 11 months. 30 days' notice will be provided prior to deletion.

This policy has been introduced to ensure that we only retain current information on your draft.

What are my rights?

As a Data Subject you have the following rights under GDPR in relation to your personal data:

  • the right to access the personal data that we hold about you, together with other information about our processing of that personal data;
  • the right to request the rectification of any inaccuracies in your personal data;
  • the right to request the erasure of your personal data;
  • the right to request that we no longer process your personal data for particular purposes;
  • the right to object to our use of your personal data or the way in which we process it; and
  • the right to receive your personal data, which you provided to us, in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format or to require us to transmit that data to another controller.

If you would like to exercise any of these rights and wish to submit a Subject Access Request, or if you have any cause for complaint about the use of your personal data by Online Planning, you can contact our Data Protection Officer by email dataprotection@lgma.ie or by telephone on 01 6332200, or by post to 35-39 Ushers Quay, Dublin 8 D08 H56R.

All valid requests will be processed without undue delay.

What are my rights in the event of a Data Breach?

Breaches of Data Protection legislation are a matter for the Data Protection Commissioner who has the power to investigate such matters and, where appropriate, prosecute offences under the Acts.

For Further information on Data Protection, please see the following:

For more information on Planning legislation, please visit www.irishstatutebook.ie.

How can you find out more about the privacy policy?

We aim to resolve any enquiries or concerns that our users may have about the processing of their personal data whilst using the Online Planning Portal service.  For any enquiry or concern about this privacy policy, we ask that you please contact the Helpdesk on planningportaltickets@lgma.ie in the first instance.

Other websites

We wish to advise that websites that are accessible through links from the Online Planning Portal are not covered by this privacy statement. We would advise that users read the relevant privacy policies when accessing other websites.

We would also advise that users that once they make an application through the Online Planning Portal that this information is passed on to the relevant local authority. We recommend that users read the privacy policies developed by their local authority to learn more about how this information will be used.