Kitchen worktops in Ruislip Manor

Yes. Remarkably consistent stock of near-identical 1930s semis, each with a rear kitchen and the old outside WC absorbed into a utility. Runs of around 3.2m with a small breakfast bar squeezed in. Gravel and block paving both look like hard standing and neither takes a loaded trolley, so the run from tail lift to door gets boarded. We aim for the first slot of the day where parking is tight, because that is when the street is emptiest. The day is built around that window.

1930s estate semi, interwar terrace and shopping parade flat. An ex-council house is solidly built to a standard plan, with the kitchen at the rear and a back door next to it. Ex-council flats and maisonettes are built in dense concrete and blockwork, so anything that has to be fixed back, such as brackets under a peninsula or support for an end panel, goes in with proper anchors and an SDS rather than plasterboard fixings. Sound carcasses are the one condition.

A grid of avenues with dropped kerbs and drives, plus a shopping parade with its own car park. Deliveries here are about as simple as they get. The van gets close to the door and the stone comes off the tail lift onto a trolley, which is about the shortest carry we ever get. Worth remembering that the old tops have to come out the way the new ones come in, and a laminate run is easier to remove in one length than to carry in one. That is agreed before a plumber is booked.

Worktop replacement, worktop installation and worktop templating, in that order. Where kitchens turn over between tenancies the priority is a surface that survives a decade of being treated as a chopping board. The fitting day is scheduled to suit that rather than to suit the diary. One visit, done properly. The stock is so uniform that a template from one house nearly fits the next, but the absorbed outside WC is where the floor and wall levels always differ.

A peninsula is an island with one end tied to a run, which means the join between them has to be planned rather than allowed to happen. Old laminate has often been holding a run square for years, and taking it off shows what the units were really doing. Height change is checked before we cut. Legs bottoming out on hard concrete or an uneven screed mean the tops of the carcasses are not one plane, and that is picked up at template rather than on fitting day. We would rather find it at template than on the morning, which is why the templater looks behind the units. 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.

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. Floors and units are protected before anything comes through the door, communal or otherwise. One visit, our own installers. 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.