Gutter Cleaning in Southbourne

Houses south of the Grove. The roads running down towards the cliff, Grand Avenue, Stourcliffe Avenue and Southern Road among them, have larger Edwardian and inter-war houses, many now split into flats. They have long eaves runs, a gutter over every bay and porch, and mature gardens dropping leaves into all of them.

On a Southbourne house we scoop each run out by hand, lift the black silt that settles in the bottom, flush every outlet and run the hose down each downpipe until it clears at the shoe. A pipe that will not run gets rodded, or looked at with a camera, before we say what is wrong with it. Most houses take a morning.

The small gutters people forget. Around a Southbourne house, bay roofs, porch canopies, the lean-to at the back and the flat roof over a garage all have their own short gutter or outlet, and those are the ones that get missed because you cannot see them from the garden. A blocked bay gutter will soak the top of the bay window and rot the frame, so they are on our list whether or not you mentioned them.

Chalets and bungalows. Lower buildings are quicker, but a Southbourne chalet bungalow with dormers has short gutters on each dormer cheek that tip onto the main roof, and those valleys fill with moss. We clear from a ladder or a vacuum pole and stay off a fragile roof covering.

Over the shops. On Southbourne Grove the gutter at the front is above the pavement and the shop signs, and the back often drains onto a flat roof or a yard. The rear is usually where the trouble is, because nobody sees it.

When it is not a clean. If a gutter still drips once it has been cleared, the cause is a perished seal at a union, a bracket that has let go, or a run that has sagged so the fall runs away from the outlet. A seal or a bracket we can refix on the same visit. A run that needs re-hanging, or rotten fascia boards behind it, is fascia, soffit and gutter replacement in Southbourne, photographed and priced before anything is done.

Thomas Hannen prices every job himself. The quote is itemised, not a figure on the back of a card: access, the length of run, the number of outlets and downpipes, any repair, and where the debris goes on separate lines, so you can compare it properly against anyone else's.

Nothing is left open or unusable overnight. The site is swept at the end of each day rather than the end of the job, and what comes out leaves with us. If something turns up once we start that nobody could have seen, you get a photograph and a price before we carry on.

Clearing gutters needs no permission, and nor does refixing a bracket. The Southbourne Grove conservation area covers the shopping street itself, the council keeps the list; inside it, or on one of the listed buildings nearby, changing the material or profile of the gutters on the front is worth checking with BCP Council first. Moving where a downpipe discharges is covered by Approved Document H.

Ring rather than use the form. Water running down a wall in a downpour soaks the brickwork and finds its way to a ceiling faster than most people expect, so it is worth dealing with before the next wet week.

We clear it, run water through to prove it, and tell you honestly if what you actually have is a broken joint rather than a blockage. If you rent a flat above a shop, tell your landlord in writing on the same day so there is a record, and move anything electrical away from the wet ceiling. Scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm. For anything urgent, ring rather than use the form, and if we cannot pick up we ring you back as soon as we can.

Call now: 07435 839745

Southbourne Grove is a conservation area in its own right, designated for the shopping street and the flats above it. Every front gutter along it sits over a public pavement, often with a shop blind or a sign in the way, and that changes how the job is done and who has to agree to it.

A ladder or a tower on the footway has to be fenced off with somebody at the bottom, and a scaffold standing on the pavement needs a licence from the council under section 169 of the Highways Act, which takes time to arrange. For a clear, we avoid that where we can: a vacuum pole from the kerb, worked early before the shops open, or the job done from the back of the building.

The other question for a Southbourne shop flat is who is responsible. The shop, the flat above and the roof may all be on different leases, with the freeholder holding the roof and the gutters. So before booking anything, check with your landlord or agent that the work is yours to order. If it is not, send them our quote. We price the front and back separately, and note any access the council would need to know about, so whoever pays can see exactly what they are paying for.

Nearby places we also cover for gutter cleaning, with straight-line distances from Southbourne, and the other trades we offer in Southbourne itself.

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