Advice on leaking roof above dormer window + Insurance

ichicc

Hi all

I have recently moved into a 3-storey townhouse with dormer windows on the top floor. Following a night of strong wind and rain around 2 weeks ago I noticed a leak around a dormer window in one of the top floor bathrooms. It looks like water has managed to seep through around the join where the dormer window meets the main sloped roof. The rain had already stopped by the time we noticed it the next morning, but there was a sizable puddle on the tiles underneath where the top of dormer meets the sloped roof, as well as damp stains on the (newly-painted ) walls around where the dormer juts out. Given that there has been quite a bit of rain in the few months since I moved in but this is the first time there has been a leak, I'm fairly sure it must have been due to the specific direction of the wind that night.

I called up the home emergency helpline of our home insurance and they sent round a roofer a couple of days later. He wasn't able to get up due to the roof being beyond the reach of his ladder, but he had a look from the inside of the bathroom and seemed fairly confident about the nature of the leak and that it would be a fairly easy/quick repair provided he could get some scaffolding up to access the roof. He mentioned he would send a report back to the insurer with a quote and would be back again within the week to fix things. Being a new and inexperienced homeowner, I was reassured by how nonchalant and confident he was about the leak and stupidly didn't ask for an indication of how much the quote would be, thinking it would certainly come well within our £1000 home emergency claim limit for the couple of hours' labour he mentioned. Well surprise surprise, a couple of days later my insurer called me with a quote for ~£2050, with £1750 for scaffolding and £300 for call-out + 2 hrs labour. This would only cover the roofer's access to the roof, and any further repairs would be charged on top! This obviously leaves me with a minimum outlay of a grand for what feels like a really minor leak... not how I wanted to start off 2021!

Apologies for the long monologue above, but I was hoping some of you might be able to help me with the following points:

• Obviously the fact that scaffolding is involved massively jacks up the price for this repair. Is there any way at all that this cost could be reduced or am I stuck on this point? As mentioned earlier it's a 3-storey terraced townhouse.
  
• Does £1750 for scaffolding (which I guess will be up for at most a day) sound like a reasonable quote? I'm in the London area so am assuming that increases it a bit, but even then it seems steep especially compared to the prices mentioned in this article: https://www.checkatrade.com/blog/cost-guides/cost-scaffolding/
• The property was built in 2012 so should still be within the NHBC coverage period. Could this be a route worth pursuing / would they cover this kind of claim?
• I have since opened up a file with my main buildings insurance cover (not the home emergency add-on) to see if they will cover this. They're due to send a surveyor over with a drone next week to check if it's a valid claim. However I'm not very hopeful on this point after doing some research online, as apparently unless there is clear evidence of tile(s) having been blown off by a storm they will chalk it up to wear and tear and reject the claim? Is there anything I can say to the insurer which will improve my chances of having it accepted?
• As stated I've only been living here for a few months so no idea what, if any, roof maintenance the previous owner did (certainly nothing that came up in our searches/surveys during the purchasing process). However, given the property is only 8 years old is it reasonable for normal wear and tear to have caused a leak like this? None of my neighbours have had this issue and they're houses were all built at the same time and look the same.
• Once the leak is fixed, what roof maintenance can be reasonably expected to avoid something like this happening again in the future? Surely people don't actually fork out £2k every year for a speculative check-up on the roof...

Sorry for the long post and thanks so much in advance for everybody's help and advice.

Thanks

ichicc

FreeBear

If you have decent access and the ground is suitable, a cherry picker could be used - That would cut the scaffolding costs down to around £500 or so.

ichicc

FreeBear said:

If you have decent access and the ground is suitable, a cherry picker could be used - That would cut the scaffolding costs down to around £500 or so.

Hi FreeBear - what would be the process for using a cherry picker? Do I need to contact the insurance company/their roofer to see if they can use one? Is the process normally to hire a cherry picker separately and then ask the roofer to use that, or will the roofer hire one / use their own?

Mickey666

I must be getting out of touch with building costs!  Last bit of scaffolding I had was for rebuilding the top of a chimney stack.  Scaffolding cost £500 and the chimney demolish/rebuilding was £600.  Was all done within the week.  That was four/five years ago.
As for a cherry picker, yes good idea if access is possible.  The same year as my chimney rebuild I hired one to install a chimney liner (different chimney) it was £180 for the day WITH an operator.
I'd ask around for some different quotes.  Often the best price for a simple repair will by a local single tradesman happy to use a roof ladder rather than a specialist company that will require full scaffolding, weekly inspections, Heras fencing around the site, on-site toilet, HSE warning signs, the works!   

FreeBear

ichicc said:

FreeBear said:

If you have decent access and the ground is suitable, a cherry picker could be used - That would cut the scaffolding costs down to around £500 or so.

Hi FreeBear - what would be the process for using a cherry picker? Do I need to contact the insurance company/their roofer to see if they can use one? Is the process normally to hire a cherry picker separately and then ask the roofer to use that, or will the roofer hire one / use their own?

You'd get the contractor to arrange hire of the cherry picker and coordinate delivery & collection with his work. That way, if he screws up on timing, he foots the bill for wasted hire time. But as this may well be an insurance job, he has little incentive to keep costs down.