The City of Tshwane has gone live with the digitisation building plan applications and processing, including related application forms.
The following application forms can now be submitted online on the e-Tshwane portal with the required supporting documentation:
- Approval of building plans
- Approval of site development plans
- Application for provisional authorisation to erect structures
- Application for permission to use a building before certificate of occupancy has been issued
- Application forms for the agreement or permission of included parties
- Complaints form
- Application for encroachment into servitude area
- Permission to obtain copies of building plans
- Application for comments from another party
This breakthrough signals a move from processing hardcopy applications and improved service delivery. Electronic notifications on the status and approval of an application and invoices in respect of the fees payable for each application are also generated online. The introduction of these applications on the e-Tshwane portal follows the initial implementation of the following land development applications which went live in October 2021.
- Rezoning
- Removal of restrictive conditions
- Consent of the Municipality in terms of the title deed
- Consent use
- Permission of additional dwelling
- Subdivision and/or consolidation
- Division of a township
- Township establishment and extension of boundaries
This enhancement of the platform effectively reduces a lot of red tape. The solution also alleviates the burden of manually checking and processing applications.
It is envisaged that the turnaround time for processing applications will be significantly improved. This means that customer experience and service delivery is improved as customers no longer need to come to any of the City’s customer care centres. The data capturing errors normally associated with the manual processing of forms are also eliminated.
The statement that we can submit building plans online is false. No one is monitoring the submissions. I have submitted and waited like a fool for feedback. The plan examiners were not even aware of the portal when I raised a question about it. One still has to do submit manually like always. Tshwane again making great plans in the boardrooms and issuing press releases but lack the capability to execute it on ground level. It is like a lame body where the brain in the head has no connection to the rest of the body whatsoever.