CAD drawing conversion: paper plans and PDFs redrawn to scale
An old paper plan, a scan from the council, a PDF from a previous owner's builder: none can be altered, and few can be trusted. We redraw them in CAD at true scale, check them against the building where we can, and give you editable files, for a fixed £195.
Fixed fee from £195 · all prices
Prefer to talk it through?
Why a scan is not a drawing
A scanned plan is a picture. You cannot move a wall on it, measure from it with confidence, or pass it to an engineer who needs coordinates. Paper shrinks and stretches, photocopies distort, and many old plans were drawn to scales that nobody now remembers. Lines drawn on a screen from such a picture inherit every error in it.
Redrawing fixes the format, but the harder part is the scale. We find a dimension that can be trusted, such as a written room size or a door height, and use that to bring each sheet to scale. Where the sheets disagree with one another, we say where, and recommend a survey rather than guess.
CAD Drawing Conversion
from £195
Every price is the full fixed fee you pay. No VAT is charged. Council application fees are paid to the council separately.
What you get
- Your plans, sections and elevations redrawn as clean, layered CAD
- Drawn to a stated metric scale, with a scale bar and north point where relevant
- Wall thicknesses, openings and stairs set out, not traced as blurred lines
- A list of discrepancies we found between sheets
- DWG and PDF files you can share with your builder, engineer or council
- A note of anything that needs a site measure before it can be relied on
- Check what you have
Scale, date, completeness and whether the sheets agree with one another.
- Scale and set out
Each sheet brought to true scale from a known dimension, not by eye.
- Redraw
Walls, doors, windows and stairs drawn as clean objects on named layers.
- Cross-check
Plans against sections and elevations, flagging any that disagree.
- Issue files
DWG and PDF, with a short note of assumptions and anything to verify on site.
What the council expects from your plans
A drawing sent to a council must be useable. Government guidance says that any plans or drawings must be drawn to an identified scale and, in the case of plans, must show the direction of north. The Development Management Procedure Order separately requires a plan identifying the land and any other plans, drawings and information necessary to describe the development.
So a converted drawing that goes into an application is held to those standards. We give each sheet a stated scale, a north point on plans and a title block with the date and revision, so the file is ready when you need it, whether for a lawful development certificate, a planning application or building control.
Government guidance says that any plans or drawings must be drawn to an identified scale and, in the case of plans, must show the direction of north.
Whose drawing is it?
Drawings are protected by copyright. Under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, a plan is a graphic work, and graphic works count as artistic works. Government guidance says copyright protection arises automatically, with no registration or fee, and that it stops others making an adaptation of the work without permission. For artistic work it usually lasts 70 years after the author's death.
In practice that means we ask you to confirm you have the right to use what you send us. If your plans were produced for you by a previous designer, their terms may decide whether they can be copied or altered; if they are the council's copies of an old application, we can still use them as a reference for measurement and redraw from a survey. Tell us where the drawings came from and we will say what is straightforward.
When a survey is the better answer
A conversion can only be as accurate as its source. If the old plans are from the 1960s, if the house has been altered since, or if you intend to build tight against a boundary, it is better to measure the building. A measured building survey gives you a drawing from the building as it stands, and the CAD file is a by-product.
We say so when we see the plans. Some owners want only the cleaner file and accept the limits; others discover that the house is 150 millimetres wider than the paper said and are glad they asked. Both are fine, and the choice is yours.
What the files are used for
The usual next steps are a planning application, an extension design, an engineer's calculations or a builder's price. Each starts better from a clean CAD plan than from a photograph of a sketch. Layers are named, line weights are sensible and the files open cleanly in the software engineers and kitchen designers use.
If you plan to alter the building, send the converted plans to us afterwards and we can carry straight into floor plans or the design for your extension, with the existing drawings already done.
Fee and limits
The fixed fee is £195, the total you pay, with no VAT charged. It covers redrawing the plans, sections and elevations of a typical house from the documents you send. Very large sets, buildings with many floors or poor-quality sources are quoted before we start.
The converted drawings reproduce your source. They are not a survey, and we say where they need a site check. Send a clear scan or photograph of each sheet, the address and anything you know about later alterations.
Sources
Every figure on this page, where it comes from and a link to the original.
| Figure | Source | Link |
|---|---|---|
| identified scale | Planning Practice Guidance, Making an application: (source wording: "Any plans or drawings must be drawn to an identified scale") | www.gov.uk |
| direction of north | Planning Practice Guidance, Making an application: (source wording: "in the case of plans, must show the direction of north") | www.gov.uk |
| necessary to describe the development | DMPO 2015 art 7(1)(c): an application must be accompanied by (source wording: "any other plans, drawings and information necessary to describe the development which is the subject of the application") | www.legislation.gov.uk |
| graphic work | Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 s.4(1)-(2): artistic work means a graphic work, and graphic work includes (source wording: "any painting, drawing, diagram, map, chart or plan") | www.legislation.gov.uk |
| making an adaptation of the work | GOV.UK, How copyright protects your work: (source wording: "You get copyright protection automatically - you do not have to apply or pay a fee"; copyright prevents people "making an adaptation of your work") | www.gov.uk |
| 70 years after the author's death | GOV.UK, How long copyright lasts: written, dramatic, musical and artistic work (source wording: "70 years after the author’s death") | www.gov.uk |