Code policies?

I was thinking the other day about how much efforts does it take to strictly follow your company code policies. They are saving time for sure, but they are also wasting time. First of all the developer needs to think about the policies all the time. This districts him/her from the real problems. Second - after the task is completed the developer again needs to check if his / her code follows the code policies. Third - if there is a code review - the code reviewer will also need to check if there isn't a problem with those code policies, class by class, member by member. Some of the rules are very very foundamental as for example not to reference the DataAccess Layer from the User Interface Layer. Other are company level rules - such as

naming conventions, using some classes on some places and not using some classes on some places. Also - using your project util classes instead implementing the same functionality in your class.

While some of the things aren't very easy to note in a code, other are obvious. And while some of the things aren't very easy to automate via AddIn or external program, other can be easilly automated.

In my opinion the developer should be focussed develop some more useful functionality, instead thinking about which rule will he / she broke.
Please note that by writing the above sentence I am not saying - "Drop the code policies!", but "Automate the code policies!". If I had some tool to check if I violate a rule while writing code, I will rewrite my code in order to satisfy this rule. But after I don't have I need to think about those rules while developing, which districts me from what I need to achieve.

I would really appreciate if you drop a comment on the following question(s):

"Does the code policy bother you? Does it take from your time? Does it districts you?"

Thanks in advance!