How to Apply for an Ealing Property Licence Without Losing Your Application Fee

The single biggest risk when applying for a property licence in Ealing is not the fee itself — it is losing the fee to the 14-day deletion window. Once you submit an application on Ealing's MetaStreet portal, the council gives you 14 days to provide any missing or invalid documents. If you do not meet that deadline, the council closes your application and keeps the Part A fee: £250 for a selective licence, £300 for an additional HMO licence, or £500 for a mandatory HMO licence. You get no licence, and if you want to try again, you pay the Part A fee a second time.

The way to avoid this is straightforward: prepare your entire application offline, verify every document against the council's exact requirements, and only open the MetaStreet portal when you have nothing left to research or gather. The portal session should be a data-entry exercise, not a research project.

Why the 14-Day Window Catches So Many Landlords

Ealing's MetaStreet portal is not like filling in a tax return where you can save your progress and come back over several weeks. The council treats an incomplete submission as an active application from the moment you pay the Part A fee. The 14-day clock starts ticking immediately.

The documents that most often cause problems:

• Gas Safety Certificate (CP12): must show zero unresolved "At Risk" or "Immediately Dangerous" codes. A certificate with outstanding remedial work is not valid for licensing, even if the boiler is still operational.
• Electrical Installation Condition Report (EICR): must explicitly state "Satisfactory" and show no C1 or C2 defects. C3 is an improvement recommendation, not one of the codes the council requires to be cleared.
• Energy Performance Certificate (EPC): must be rated A to E, unless a valid Minimum Energy Efficiency Standards (MEES) exemption is registered. For an F or G rating, confirm the exemption and the council's current requirements before applying.
• Floor plan: must be drawn to show room dimensions, door and window positions, room uses, and the locations of smoke detectors and carbon monoxide alarms. The council accepts hand-drawn plans — you do not need a professional surveyor — but missing annotations are a common reason for the 14-day rejection.

A landlord who starts the MetaStreet application thinking they will "sort the floor plan later" or "get the EICR re-done while the application is processing" is exactly the landlord who loses the Part A fee.

The Pre-Submission Method

The safest approach to any Ealing licence application is to work through the entire process on paper before you go anywhere near the portal.

Step 1: Confirm which licence you need. This sounds obvious, but it is the step most prone to error. Ealing's selective licensing designations use pre-May 2022 ward boundaries — not the current electoral wards. If you use a modern postcode lookup tool, you may get the wrong answer. Check your property address against the designation documents to confirm whether it falls in Designation 1 (East Acton, Southall Broadway, Southall Green), Designation 2 (12 wards including Acton Central, Dormers Wells, Greenford Broadway, Perivale), or neither. If your property is an HMO with three or four tenants from two or more households, the borough-wide additional HMO scheme applies regardless of ward; at five or more occupants, mandatory HMO licensing applies.

Step 2: Gather every document. Before you open the portal, have in front of you:

• A valid gas safety certificate with no unresolved safety codes
• An EICR marked "Satisfactory" (less than 5 years old)
• An EPC rated A–E (less than 10 years old), or proof of a valid registered MEES exemption
• A floor plan with room dimensions, doors, windows, room uses and alarm positions
• Proof of NRLA or LLAS accreditation, if you have it (saves £75 on Part B)
• Your property's council tax reference number
• Your ID and proof of address

Step 3: Verify each document. Do not assume a certificate is valid because you have one. Check the gas safety certificate for any "At Risk" or "Immediately Dangerous" notations. Check the EICR for a clear "Satisfactory" outcome. Check the EPC rating. Check the floor plan has every annotation the council requires. A single invalid document is all it takes.

Step 4: Calculate your fees. Know exactly what you will pay at each stage:

• Part A (application processing) — paid on submission
• Part B (licence grant) — paid when the council is ready to issue
• Discounts — £75 for accreditation, £50 for EPC A–C
• Surcharges — £100 for paper applications (apply online to avoid this)

Step 5: Open the portal and submit. With everything prepared, the portal session should take 30–60 minutes. You are entering data and uploading files, not researching requirements.

What the Guide Adds to This Process

The five steps above are the principle. The Landlord Licensing in Ealing guide is the execution tool: it gives you seven printable worksheets — scheme decision, address verification, document audit, fee calculator, compliance tracker, licence lifecycle tracker and council communication log — plus a hand-drawn floor plan guide with sample layouts, so you can work through each step with a structured checklist rather than trying to hold the entire process in your head.

The guide covers all three Ealing schemes in one document, which matters if you are not entirely sure whether your property needs a selective licence, an additional HMO licence, a mandatory HMO licence, or — for a qualifying converted block — a Section 257 building licence alongside any required flat-level licence. HMO licensing takes precedence over selective licensing for the same dwelling. The scheme decision workflow starts with your property address and walks through ward boundaries, occupancy and household composition until you have a definitive answer.

Who This Is For

• Landlords applying for their first Ealing property licence who want to get it right on the first attempt
• Landlords who have had an application rejected or deleted and are reapplying
• Landlords renewing a licence who want to confirm their documents are still valid before the portal session
• Anyone who has heard about the 14-day deletion window and wants a methodical way to avoid it
• Landlords managing from outside London who cannot easily visit the council if something goes wrong mid-application

Who This Is NOT For

• Landlords whose properties are outside the London Borough of Ealing — the fees, ward boundaries and portal process are Ealing-specific
• Landlords who have already submitted a complete application and are waiting for the council's decision — this is about preparation, not post-submission follow-up
• Anyone looking for legal advice on an enforcement notice or civil penalty they have already received

Common Mistakes That Cost the Part A Fee

Mistake 1: Using the wrong ward map. A landlord in Greenford checks a 2024 ward map, sees their property listed in "Greenford Green," and concludes selective licensing does not apply because the designation also says "Greenford Green" — but the pre-May 2022 ward of the same name had different boundaries. The property might actually fall inside the old Greenford Green ward or it might not. Only the designation boundary documents give the correct answer.

Mistake 2: Uploading an EICR with outstanding codes. A C1 or C2 code means the report does not meet the council's stated requirement for a "Satisfactory" EICR with no C1 or C2 defects. Arrange remedial work and confirm the report meets that requirement before applying; a C3 code alone is not listed as a disqualifying code.

Mistake 3: Submitting a floor plan without alarm positions. The council requires smoke detector and carbon monoxide alarm positions marked on the floor plan. A plan showing room dimensions and layout but omitting alarm locations is treated as incomplete.

Mistake 4: Forgetting the EPC rating threshold. An EPC rated F or G does not meet the minimum Band E requirement unless a valid MEES exemption is registered. Confirm that the exemption applies and that the application meets the council's current requirements before applying.

Mistake 5: Applying on paper without realising the surcharge. Paper applications carry a £100 surcharge in Ealing. Apply online through the MetaStreet portal to avoid this.

Tradeoffs

Preparing everything offline before submitting — pros:

• Eliminates the 14-day deadline pressure entirely
• Lets you catch document issues when you still have time to fix them
• Reduces the portal session to a straightforward data-entry task
• Saves money if it prevents a rejected application and a second Part A fee

Preparing everything offline before submitting — cons:

• Takes several hours of preparation over a few days
• You need to obtain and verify all certificates before you start, which means coordinating with gas engineers, electricians and energy assessors on their schedules
• If a certificate comes back invalid (C2 codes on the EICR, for example), you may need to arrange remedial work and a re-inspection before you can proceed

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I get the Part A fee refunded if my application is rejected?

No. Ealing Council's published policy states that application fees are not refundable, regardless of the outcome. The Part A fee covers the council's administrative processing costs, and it is retained whether the application succeeds, fails or is deleted for incomplete documents.

What happens if I submit on day 13 of the 14-day window?

The council assesses document completeness, not submission speed. If you upload a missing document on day 13 and it is valid, the council should process it. But if the document itself is invalid — an EICR with outstanding C2 codes, for example — uploading it does not satisfy the requirement, and the council may still close the application on day 14.

How long does it take to get the licence after a complete application?

The council validates the application, then issues a Notice of Intent with proposed conditions and a 21-day period for written representations before making its final decision. Track the live application through the portal and council correspondence; the research does not establish a standard end-to-end processing time.

Do I need separate applications for selective licensing and additional HMO licensing?

No. HMO licensing takes precedence over selective licensing for the same dwelling, so it does not require both licences. A qualifying Section 257 building licence is separate from any Part 2 or Part 3 licence required for an individual flat within that building.

What is the MetaStreet portal?

MetaStreet is the online platform Ealing Council uses for property licensing applications. It is a separate system from the main ealing.gov.uk website. You create an account, enter your property details, upload documents and pay fees through this portal. The guide includes a step-by-step walkthrough of the portal process.

See more England guides →