NSW Development Application: Planning Approval for a Pet Business

The gate, and the fork

In New South Wales you lodge a development application, and if it succeeds you receive development consent. It is the only state where the application and the approval have different names, which is one reason people ring their council asking about the wrong thing.

NSW also has a real fast lane. It is called a complying development certificate, and the Department's own guide for business and industry says complying development "can be approved in as little as 10 to 20 days by either a private certifier or a Council" (planning.nsw.gov.au).

Whether a grooming salon can use that fast lane turns on one classification, and no NSW planning authority publishes what that classification is for pet grooming. This post shows you where the fork sits, what each answer costs you, and the question to put to your council before you sign anything. For the national picture, start with our guide to planning approval across Australia.

This guide is general information for pet business owners in New South Wales. It is not legal, planning, accounting or financial advice, and it does not take account of your circumstances or your site. Australian development approval is set across state legislation, state planning instruments and local planning schemes, each published separately. This guide brings that fragmented material together. It is based on publicly available information, verified on 9 August 2026, and linked at the point each fact is stated. We maintain those links and re-check them, but we do not control what those bodies publish, and planning instruments change. You remain responsible for your own position: confirm it with your council or a qualified town planner, and make your own decision before you act. Petboost accepts no responsibility for any action taken on the basis of this article. Planning outcomes are also site-specific and discretionary: two identical businesses on two streets in the same council area can get different answers, and nothing here predicts what an authority will decide. If anything is inaccurate, tell us and we will correct it.

1. What it is called here, and who decides

NSW planning sits under the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act 1979. What applies to your address comes from three layers: state environmental planning policies, your council's local environmental plan (LEP), and its development control plan (DCP).

For an ordinary application the Department is direct about who decides: "Development consents are issued by the consent authority. This is usually the local council, but can sometimes be the Minister for Planning if specified in a SEPP" (planning.nsw.gov.au).

The fast-lane certificate is the part most first-timers miss. It can be determined "by a council or an accredited certifier" (planning.nsw.gov.au), or as the NSW Government building pages put it, "Your local council or a registered certifier can issue a complying development certificate (CDC)" (nsw.gov.au). Same job, two words: older pages say accredited, newer ones say registered. Certifiers appear on the Building Certifiers Public Register (applications.fairtrading.nsw.gov.au), and you are told to "check the certifier has the right class of registration for the work" (nsw.gov.au).

So: a development application is decided by the consent authority, usually your council. A complying development certificate is the thing a private certifier can also issue.

2. Your pathways here

NSW publishes nine approval pathways (planning.nsw.gov.au). Four are reachable by a pet business. The rest are for infrastructure and projects in the tens of millions.

The exempt change-of-use table is the one a shopfront tenant needs. The NSW Planning Portal states "Planning approval is not required for changes of use that keep within the business categories in the table below", and its first category groups business premises, office premises, shop, kiosk and public administration building (planningportal.nsw.gov.au). It adds that "A change from one type of retail shop to another is not considered to be a change of use, but a change of tenant." Heritage items, critical habitat and wilderness areas sit outside the pathway.

The fast lane has four conditions, from the Department's pocket guide: the premises must be in an employment, mixed-use or special purpose zone; the use must be permitted on the site in the LEP; the use must be on the list of specified purposes eligible for a change of use; and the land must not carry affections such as heritage items or high-risk bushfire areas. It is also "not eligible if it requires concurrence, is designated development or needs an environmental protection licence". Fit-out works can be combined with the change of use in one application.

NSW does not publish a DA fee. The Department publishes only that "Fees are set out in the EP&A Regulation and payment must accompany an application. Fees are based on your estimated cost of the development" (planning.nsw.gov.au). Your council publishes its own schedule. We would rather say that than invent a range.

And the clock stops. From the same page: "If the council finds it needs more information, the clock stops until you provide the required information." That, not the published number, decides how long your application really takes.

3. What your use is called here

Every NSW council's LEP is built from the same template, the Standard Instrument. The Department's practice note says councils "are not able to alter the standard definitions or directly add definitions to the Dictionary" (planning.nsw.gov.au), so the definitions below are the same in every local government area in the state.

Two of them could describe a grooming salon. Both are from the Standard Instrument (legislation.nsw.gov.au), current version for 1 July 2026.

business premises means a building or place at or on which: (a) an occupation, profession or trade (other than an industry) is carried on for the provision of services directly to members of the public on a regular basis, or (b) a service is provided directly to members of the public on a regular basis, and includes funeral homes, goods repair and reuse premises and, without limitation, premises such as banks, post offices, hairdressers, dry cleaners, travel agencies, betting agencies and the like, but does not include an entertainment facility, home business, home occupation, home occupation (sex services), medical centre, restricted premises, sex services premises or veterinary hospital.

animal boarding or training establishment means a building or place used for the breeding, boarding, training, keeping or caring of animals for commercial purposes (other than for the agistment of horses), and includes any associated riding school or ancillary veterinary hospital.

The wording is unchanged, except that the dash in the first definition has been replaced with a colon.

Both arms are on the face of the words. A grooming salon provides a service directly to members of the public on a regular basis, and the definition names hairdressers as an example. It also cares for animals commercially, and nothing in the second definition requires an overnight stay.

Here is what turns on it. Business premises is a type of commercial premises, and commercial premises is a specified purpose under clause 5A.2(1)(c) of the Codes SEPP (legislation.nsw.gov.au), so a change of use to it may be complying development in a business or industrial zone. Animal boarding or training establishment appears nowhere in the Codes SEPP, and clause 5A.2(1) is a closed list of what a specified purpose is. A use not on the list cannot use that pathway.

Same shopfront, same fit-out, two entirely different processes.

We are not going to tell you which one you are. No NSW planning instrument, department guide or planning circular names pet grooming in either direction, and we read both instruments in full. What exists instead is one close analogue and one method.

The analogue. In Solid Gold Custodians Pty Ltd ATF SGH Property Trust v Inner West Council [2024] NSWLEC 1835, decided 20 December 2024, a Commissioner of the Land and Environment Court applied this same definition and said "It is clear, therefore, that a hair and beauty salon is a business premises, which means that it is a type of commercial premises" (caselaw.nsw.gov.au). Read it precisely: it is about human hairdressing, it is a Commissioner's decision in a merits appeal rather than binding precedent, and it does not decide the pet question.

The method. Planning Circular PS 21-008 says a development "is considered to be for a particular purpose if that purpose is the dominant purpose of the development", being "the reason for which the development is to be undertaken or the end to which the development serves" (planning.nsw.gov.au). In plain words, the council asks what the place is really for, and anything subordinate goes with it. A salon whose point is a service delivered to the owner, with the dog there only while it is groomed, pulls one way. A facility whose point is having animals in its care, with grooming as one of the things done to them while they are there, pulls the other. Where boarding was dominant, the Court characterised the whole thing, grooming salon included, as an animal boarding or training establishment (caselaw.nsw.gov.au).

One thing that looks like an answer and is not. Several NSW councils publish a keeping of animals policy listing grooming among commercial animal purposes needing a DA, such as Central Coast's (cdn.centralcoast.nsw.gov.au). Those policies are made under the order and nuisance power in section 124 of the Local Government Act 1993, not under the planning Act. They show how councils think. They are not a land use classification and should not be read as one.

Key Takeaway: Ask your council one question, in writing, before you sign: for this address, in this zone, what land use term applies to a dog grooming salon, and is a change of use to it complying development? The Department's own circular tells you where: "Pre-DA meetings (a meeting held prior to the lodgement of any development application) with council planning staff are available in all local government areas."

4. Existing use rights here

If the premises already has a lawful use that current planning rules would prohibit, that use can continue. Section 4.65 of the EP&A Act defines an existing use as "the use of a building, work or land for a lawful purpose immediately before the coming into force of an environmental planning instrument which would, but for this Division, have the effect of prohibiting that use" (caselaw.nsw.gov.au).

Twelve months of non-use is what ends it. Section 4.66(3): "a use is to be presumed, unless the contrary is established, to be abandoned if it ceases to be actually so used for a continuous period of 12 months" (caselaw.nsw.gov.au). The presumption can be rebutted with evidence. A temporary extension to three years applied only between 25 March 2020 and 25 March 2022 and has expired, so do not rely on it. If you are counting on a vacant shop's history, when it last actually traded is the first thing to establish.

The provision worth real money is section 163 of the Environmental Planning and Assessment Regulation 2021, taken to be incorporated into every LEP. It allows an existing use, "if it is a commercial use, be changed to another commercial use, including a commercial use that would otherwise be prohibited under the Act" (a dash in the original replaced with a comma). Four conditions apply: minor alterations only, no more than a 10 per cent increase in gross floor area, no rebuilding, and no significant intensification.

And the part people get wrong. Existing use rights are not an exemption from approval. Section 167(1)(a) of the same regulation: "Development consent is required for a change of an existing use to another use." They can make an otherwise prohibited use possible. They do not remove the development application.

5. If you are refused

Three options, from the Department's determination page (planning.nsw.gov.au): ask the council for a review of determination, appeal to the Land and Environment Court, or modify and relodge. Both the review and the appeal carry a six month limit. A consent, once granted, "lasts for 5 years unless another period is specified by council or physical commencement has occurred".

Appeals go to Class 1 of the Court, which describes that jurisdiction as "merits review of administrative decisions of local or State government under various planning or environmental laws" (lec.nsw.gov.au).

You can also appeal silence. If the council does not decide in time, the application is taken to have been determined and the six month appeal window starts: 40 days for ordinary development, 60 days for designated or integrated development, 90 days for State significant development (lec.nsw.gov.au).

Filing fees from 1 July 2026, for a Class 1 appeal about a development valued at less than $500,000 (lec.nsw.gov.au):

The note under that schedule matters here: "Sole traders are charged the individual rate." A Pty Ltd pays the corporation rate. This is the Court's filing fee only, not the cost of running an appeal, and we are not publishing an estimate of legal or expert costs because nobody publishes one.

What we could not verify

• Which classification a grooming-only salon takes. Both instruments read in full, plus every department page, guide and circular we could reach. No NSW authority states it.
• Whether neighbours are notified for a business or industry complying development certificate. Nothing we read says either way, so do not assume they are not.
• A statutory maximum for determining a complying development certificate. "As little as 10 to 20 days" is the Department's phrasing, not a published deadline.
• Any NSW DA fee figure. Published only as a function of your estimated development cost.
• Any NSW council control aimed at a shopfront grooming salon in a commercial zone. We found none, but a number of council websites blocked us, so treat that as not found rather than as proof none exists.

One contrast is worth ending on. NSW does regulate pet grooming by name, just not in planning. Animal Welfare Code of Practice No 8 covers animals in pet grooming establishments and states "You must comply with this code if you intend to operate a pet grooming or bathing establishment" (ablis.business.gov.au). The welfare rules name you. The land use rules do not, which is the whole reason to ask your council rather than assume.

Verified 9 August 2026 against the sources below. Planning instruments change, and planning decisions are made on the merits of each site, so nothing here predicts what your authority will decide. Check the linked source and confirm your own position with your council or a qualified town planner before you act.

Sources

• NSW Planning, Planning approval pathways: planning.nsw.gov.au
• NSW Planning, Complying development: planning.nsw.gov.au
• NSW Planning, Local development: planning.nsw.gov.au
• NSW Planning, Complying Development for Business and Industry: A Pocket Guide: planning.nsw.gov.au
• NSW Planning, Stage 2 Lodging your development application: planning.nsw.gov.au
• NSW Planning, Stage 4 Determination: planning.nsw.gov.au
• NSW Planning, Planning Circular PS 21-008 Land use characterisation: planning.nsw.gov.au
• NSW Planning, LEP Practice Note PN 11-003 Standard Instrument definitions: planning.nsw.gov.au
• NSW Planning Portal, Change of use (exempt development): planningportal.nsw.gov.au
• NSW Legislation, Standard Instrument Principal Local Environmental Plan: legislation.nsw.gov.au
• NSW Legislation, State Environmental Planning Policy (Exempt and Complying Development Codes) 2008: legislation.nsw.gov.au
• NSW Government, Approvals needed for your building project: nsw.gov.au
• NSW Government, Finding and appointing a certifier: nsw.gov.au
• NSW Fair Trading, Building Certifiers Public Register: applications.fairtrading.nsw.gov.au
• Land and Environment Court of NSW, Class 1 environmental planning and protection appeals: lec.nsw.gov.au
• Land and Environment Court of NSW, Development application appeals: lec.nsw.gov.au
• Land and Environment Court of NSW, Schedule of court fees: lec.nsw.gov.au
• NSW Caselaw, Solid Gold Custodians Pty Ltd ATF SGH Property Trust v Inner West Council [2024] NSWLEC 1835: caselaw.nsw.gov.au
• NSW Caselaw, Private Property Pty Limited v Mid-Coast Council [2022] NSWLEC 1738: caselaw.nsw.gov.au
• NSW Caselaw, Sixjay Newport Pty Ltd v Northern Beaches Council [2023] NSWLEC 1109: caselaw.nsw.gov.au
• Central Coast Council, Policy K1 Keeping of Animals: cdn.centralcoast.nsw.gov.au
• ABLIS, Animal Welfare Code of Practice No 8 Animals in Pet Grooming Establishments: ablis.business.gov.au