Patios in Spetisbury, built through a side gate

Getting in and out. A standard side gate takes a micro digger and a barrow, and where there is no gate we board and sheet a route through the house. Spoil goes by barrow to a skip on the road, or a grab lorry booked to arrive as the dig finishes.

The dig. Turf, topsoil, old concrete, a coal shed base and boundary hedge roots get excavated back to a firm formation. On the sixties and seventies houses here the garden is often part builder's spoil, which digs easily and holds nothing, so we go down until the ground stops moving.

The sub base. MOT type 1 barrowed in and compacted in layers rather than tipped and levelled. It is the part that decides whether the patio is still flat in ten years. A geotextile goes under it where the subgrade is soft.

Porcelain paving. The easiest material to move through a house, because it is thinner and calibrated, so every slab is the same and the bed stays even. Almost no absorption, so it does not stain and stays cleaner on a shaded terrace than stone.

Sandstone, limestone and granite. Riven sandstone suits an older brick terrace. Limestone and travertine are flatter and more even in colour. Granite is dense and good for a step tread. Riven stone is not calibrated, so each slab is bedded to its own thickness.

Full bed, not dabs. A full wet mortar bed under the whole slab, with a slurry primer on the back of porcelain. Not five dabs, and not a sand screed. A dabbed slab goes hollow and cracks the first time a table leg lands in the middle of it.

Falls and levels. The fall runs away from the house and the surface sits at least two courses below the damp proof course, the DPC. Where the garden is higher than the floor that means digging out and holding the ground back rather than paving over it.

Drainage. A linear channel across a low threshold into a gully, or a permeable build up feeding a soakaway at the far end. Runoff has to stay on your ground rather than run into next door's, which matters more on a narrow plot than on an open one.

Edges, steps and retaining. A haunched edging or kerb holds the outer course. Where a border sits above the paving we build a retaining edge with a coping. Steps get a full bed and an overhang so water drips clear of the riser.

Jointing and repairs. Joints get a resin grout you brush in damp, or traditional pointing on riven stone. We also lift and relay: a sunk bay, a rocking flag, a cracked slab, pointing washed out, staining, efflorescence, and a green slippery surface on the shaded side.

No rate per square metre, because the slabs are the part you choose and the smallest part of the price.

Getting to it. A semi with a wide side path, a mid terrace with no side access at all and a bungalow with a gate straight off the lane are three different jobs before a slab is priced. Everything comes in and goes out through the garden, often through a side gate or the house. A patio you can barrow to directly is a different job from one where every slab is carried. The work at height rules still apply to the dig and the machinery.

What is coming out before anything goes down. An old concrete slab, a raised bed, tree roots or made ground all have to be dug out and taken away, and that is priced by the load rather than by the metre. The dig is where a patio quote is won or lost.

Falls, levels and the damp course. A patio has to fall away from the house and finish at least two courses below the damp proof course, and getting that right often means steps, a retaining edge or a drainage channel. Laying a new patio up against a wall at the wrong level is the single most expensive mistake on this kind of job.

Comparing quotes? Ask how deep the dig goes and what sub base is specified, whether the slabs are laid on a full wet bed or on dabs, what the falls are and where the water goes, whether edgings and steps are included, and what the jointing compound is. Two quotes for the same job are usually two different jobs.

Terraced and semi detached houses make up well over half the stock here, and on that kind of plot the route into the back garden changes a patio job more than anything else. A semi usually has a path down one side, sometimes wide enough for a barrow and sometimes only for a person. A mid terrace has nothing.

That changes the method and the hours, not whether the work can be done. Everything is hand loaded: the dig out by barrow, the sub base in by barrow, the slabs carried one at a time. A micro digger gets through a standard gate gap, and where it will not, the dig is by hand.

So ask any quote how the spoil is leaving and how the stone is coming in, because that is where two prices for the same patio separate. If the route goes through the house, floors are boarded and covered before anything is carried, and nothing is left in a hallway overnight.

We cover the village, Charlton Marshall, Sturminster Marshall and the lanes along the valley, broadly DT11, under Dorset Council. You are dealing with Bournemouth Roofing & Building, the trading name of Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, registered in England and Wales, company number 15471719, which you can look up in a minute. Thomas Hannen's business, and he is the one who comes out to price the job, not a salesman. A verified customer's 10 out of 10 on Checkatrade. The visit and the written quote are both free.