Kitchen worktops in Alibon

Yes. Eastern Becontree housing towards Dagenham, similar house types but with more maisonettes and low-rise flats mixed in, so a share of the work is first-floor kitchens with a fixed narrow footprint. In the houses, the pattern is the usual scullery-plus-larder conversion into a single L, often with the back door repositioned during the works. Where the van can pull up level with the gate the pieces are handled the fewest times, which is what actually protects them. The templating visit needs somewhere to stop for two or three hours, which is a different problem from unloading for twenty minutes. It goes on the job sheet for the fitting crew.

1930s LCC cottage estate house, ex-council semi and post-war maisonette. These are built in dense concrete, so support for a peninsula or an end panel goes in with proper anchors rather than plugs. Concrete and dense block walls in ex-council stock cannot be chased back or packed out to suit, so the template takes the wall exactly as it is and the stone carries the scribe. No stone is ever cut from a plan.

Estate roads with easy parking, but maisonette blocks mean an external stair or shared entrance and a first-floor carry with a turn at the top. Weight tells on a staircase more than anywhere else, because there is nowhere to set a piece down mid-flight and no way to change your grip once it is moving. A template taken without walking the route produces a drawing that cuts beautifully and will not go in. The template records it along with everything else.

Worktop replacement, worktop templating and worktop installation, in that order. A worktop replacement between tenancies is a single-day job by design, because the flat is not earning while it is empty. The units stay and only the surface changes, so the whole job is one day rather than a kitchen refit. A day, not a project. Maisonette stairs here are external and often steep, so we cut to a length two people can carry safely up them rather than the longest possible piece.

An L can be mitred at the corner for a continuous look or butt-jointed over the gable, and the two are different money and different risk. A layout templated off one wall instead of one datum will not sit right once all the pieces are down together. Real angles, not plan angles. A notch around a boxed stack is machined with a radius at the internal corner, because a square inside corner there is exactly where a top will crack. The old top has been hiding it, so the first honest look at it happens when the laminate comes off. Found at template, not on fit day. Material runs from £110 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted on their own lines rather than rolled into one figure.

These kitchens tend to be compact and reasonably square, so the fixed template, fabrication and fitting lines are a larger share of the total than the stone is. A half-day of access is not a fitting day, and it is better to say so at booking than to find out at eleven. Access for the whole slot, or a different day. Tell us the building when you book and the lift, the stair turn and any freeholder notice get built into the day rather than found on it.