Worktop templating in Hampton Hill

Yes. Hampton Hill is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are TW12. It is run from the New Malden side, covering South West London & Surrey. Off-street parking means the van stays put all day, so tools, packers and the offcut we would rather have than not are all within reach. A templater circling for a space arrives late into a slot that was already tight, and the drawing is what suffers. It goes on the job sheet for the fitting crew. We template in your kitchen and fit in your kitchen, so there is nothing to visit and nothing to collect.

A flat over a shop is reached by a separate street door and a straight steep stair, and that stair is the whole access question. The scribe at worktop height differs from the one at plinth level, and only the worktop line matters. Recorded as it is, not as it was drawn. Flats above the shops have a stair with a tight top landing, so anything over 2.4m has to be jointed - measure the landing, not just the stair width.

High Street loading is timed and the parade is busy, so flats above shops mean a street door, a straight steep stair and a right-angle turn at the top; the residential roads behind have driveways and are far easier. A walk-up with winders at every half-landing means the piece is rested and re-gripped on the way, so the crew size goes up before the piece size comes down. The templater measures that route on the same visit, so the drawing leaves site already knowing the maximum piece. It goes on the drawing with the run dimensions. Tell us what the approach looks like when you book the template and it gets built into the day rather than discovered on it.

It is one of the three we do most here, behind worktop replacement. Same template visit, same workshop, same installers either way. Party-wall and lease conditions in a converted building set when noisy work can happen, which shapes the fitting day more than the kitchen does. Two to three hours on site, with the sink, tap and hob physically present. The room as it is, not as it was drawn. In a converted house the flat entrance and the internal doorway are usually tighter than the communal stairs, and that is easy to overlook. The template visit is booked once the units are genuinely in, not when they are nearly in. Units fitted, fixed and level first.

Two runs meeting at an internal corner is the most common shape we fit, and the corner is where the decisions are. Join positions and vein direction are marked on the template drawing before it leaves site. One datum for the whole room. Material is £110-£550 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted on their own lines.

Walls that bow along their length are the normal condition rather than the exception, and a straight-cut back edge will show a shadow gap at one end and touch at the other. One measurement never describes it, which is why a tape reading taken before the visit rarely matches the template. Plotted, not estimated. Units fixed, packed level and pushed as far back as the leaning wall allows, walls made good to final thickness with tiling left until after the worktop, and the sink, tap and hob on site so cut-outs are set from the real items. Mixed ownership means the decision-maker is not always the person who lets us in, so it is worth being clear early about who signs the quote off. A template booked hopefully around another trade is the commonest cause of a wasted visit. Appliances on site, not on order.