Handyman Services in Stanmore

Yes. Before drilling we check what the wall is made of, since an extended house can have solid masonry in one room and plasterboard partitions next door. For a large mirror or television on a stud wall, we find the studs or use fixings rated for the weight instead of trusting standard plugs.

Moving a socket, adding a light on a new circuit or anything inside the consumer unit is electrical work that needs a certificate. Swapping a gas hob or working on a gas fire needs a Gas Safe registered engineer. A crack that keeps reopening may be structural, which is outside what we do. We review the list before arriving, flag those items, and the right trade can often join the same visit.

Not before checking. In any conservation area, a dish on a chimney, wall or roof slope that faces and can be seen from a road needs planning permission. Harrow goes further in places: across the Canons Park Estate the usual right to install, alter or replace a dish has been removed, and the 2003 directions do the same for the addresses they schedule around Little Common and on Stanmore Hill. Elsewhere in a conservation area, a dish at the back of the house, out of sight of the road, can usually go up without an application if it stays within the size limits. Harrow's Stanmore Hill appraisal points dishes to rear gardens or the least exposed part of the back of the house, and says one on the front will not normally be acceptable. Check with Harrow's conservation team, and once you have the answer we can fit it.

Often, yes. Sticking timber casements, loose door furniture, a split front-door panel or a damaged picture rail can usually be repaired rather than replaced, which keeps the character that the Canons Park and Stanmore Hill conservation areas are protecting. On the Canons Park Estate, Harrow's appraisal notes that many houses still have their original wooden front doors, which were varnished rather than painted, and casement windows, timber or metal, with leaded lights; it discourages plastic doors. Where a part cannot be saved, we try to match it. Replacing windows or front doors facing the road is a different job and may need planning permission.

Yes, as a series of booked visits. On each one we can check for leaks, run the taps, test the alarms, look over the garden boundaries and gates, and send you photographs. Anything found is reported with a price before we fix it, unless it is an emergency, which we make safe straight away. It suits owners who travel or who are between tenants.

We can replace the damaged fence panels, but the tree is a job for a tree surgeon, and in a Stanmore conservation area it needs notice first. Under section 211 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, anyone intending to cut down or prune a tree in a conservation area must give Harrow six weeks' notice unless the council agrees sooner, and a tree with a preservation order needs consent. Harrow's Stanmore Hill appraisal counts the green, well-treed gardens behind the street frontages among the area's assets. Sort the tree first, then book the fence.