Our consent service fees and charges

Over the last decade – due to multiple regional rule frameworks being put in place, changing central government direction, changing environmental needs, and multiple court rulings - processing consent applications has become increasingly complicated. This has impacted the speed and cost of processing for us and, more importantly, for the applicant.

What have we done to address this?

We have been investing in people and systems to reduce this complexity and the overall cost of consenting. We have cleared the backlog of consent applications and introduced a direct decision fixed fee pathway for eligible applications, for example.

As one more step to further reduce the complexity, we are now proposing to introduce a clear, simplified deposit framework.

In our Revenue and Financing Policy we have a stated aim to ensure user-pays income covers 60-80% of the cost of consenting services overall, including processing consent applications. We are currently sitting at 56%, with general rates covering the rest.

As we detailed in our Long-Term Plan budgets, we are proposing to increase user-pays cost recovery to 66% in 2025/26 to comply with our policy and bring us within the policy range.

When we reviewed the consenting fees and charges we also noticed a number of other areas where fees could be reduced or increased to better reflect actual costs. We are proposing to adjust some additional fees and charges for the 2025/26 year onwards.

When you apply for a resource consent, you need to pay the costs that are involved in assessing and processing your application.

There are costs whether your application is granted or declined. Some costs are fixed at the beginning of the processing, but for most applications we have set deposits. When being charged deposits, applicants at the end of processing still need to pay any extra based on the actual work done. Where the actual processing cost is lower than the deposit, a refund may be provided.

What does this proposal look like?

Instead of having 19 different deposits, we’re proposing to have only four regardless of activity (e.g. water or land use consent) or risk level (e.g. risk of the activity negatively affecting the environment):

• $5,000 deposit for one consent

• $7,500 for two consents

• $10,000 for three or more consents, and

• $3,500 for residential on-site wastewater system consent.

An improved service

These proposed changes will provide certainty for applicants by making the cost more transparent and make it less likely that they will receive a larger-than-expected invoice at the end of their application process.

If we implement these changes, the final processing cost would remain the same. If we do not implement these changes there will continue to be confusion for some customers and more administration time needed for staff, which in turn adds cost.

We want to ensure that the amount those who pay for consent services is in line with our Revenue and Financing Policy, which states that 60-80% of the cost of consenting services overall is to be paid by the user and the rest is supported by general ratepayers.

• This year (2024/25) we are anticipating 56% of the costs of the consents service will be covered by revenue from users (consent applicants). The Long-Term Plan 2024-34 budget for Year 2 is based on achieving a 66% cost recovery in 2025/26.
• To do this, the hourly charge for consent services needs to increase by, on average, 14.1% to better reflect actual costs. This increase would be covered by those people using this service.

What does this proposal look like?

In 2025/26, we’re proposing to increase consent hourly charges by an average 14.1%. If we do implement this change, we will move closer to achieving user revenue levels specified in the Long-Term Plan.

The other option

An alternative is to reach our intended targets in a staged way over time. As an example, this could see us increase hourly charges by an average of 4.7% in 2025/26, with further increases in following years.

• If we implement this change in a staged way, our revenue from user-pays would not be enough to meet the 66% target.
• This means we wouldn’t be back within the policy range in 2025/26. This means general ratepayers would continue to off-set the costs for this service while we work to move within the targets set out in the Revenue and Financing Policy.

Hourly charges for staff have not increased since 2021. The costs indicated above are not the salaries for these officers and include all overheads. The proposed costs are based on the actual cost of the work we did over the last two years.

The proposed increase is an average increase across all consent staff charges rather than a blanket percentage increase for every individual staff charge.

For 2025/26, we are proposing to increase the hourly charges only for the consents-related services. This does not affect any other hourly charges, such as compliance visits, which will be reviewed in coming years.

Examples of changes to hourly charges

The tables below captures examples of the possible cost impact of changing staff hourly charges.

It is important to note: the costs provided in the table below are based on average costs. Actual costs may be different because consent costs can vary significantly depending on a variety of factors, including:

• the quality of the application
• the receiving environment, and
• the scale and significance of the project.

These elements can all influence the time, resources, advice and assessments required, resulting in variations to overall costs.

We have identified some areas where fees and charges can now be reduced due to improved systems and processes, and some where we need to increase the charges to cover the actual costs incurred. We have also identified some parts of the Fees and Charges Schedule (PDF file, 1.2MB) where the information could be made clearer.

We are therefore proposing changes to:

• Certificate of Compliance

• Fee for returned applications

• Fees for transfers/surrenders

• Change of conditions deposit

• Deemed permitted activity assessment

• Bore consent.

What would that look like?

If we do not implement these changes some customers may be undercharged, for example those paying fixed fees for transfers/surrenders, and others may be paying too much, such as those paying the current fixed fee for a certificate of compliance – which is proposed to change to a lower deposit.

We will also retain a fixed fee of $3,500 for consent applications that are high quality, complete and that staff determine are able to be decided quickly using our Direct Decision Pathway (introduced in 2023/24).