Painting versus a roof job
Painters need closer lifts and a platform they can move along, not a roof-edge set for a covering. Fascias, soffits, bargeboards, first-floor windows and the whole render face are the usual brief. We set lift heights for the brush, not for a roofer’s eaves.
A 2-storey front with fascia and windows is often one elevation and a short hire. All four sides of a detached, plus the chimney stack the painter ‘might get to’, is a different quote. Be honest about the scope — we would rather price the house than the hopeful version.
Ladders, towers and when we say no
A stable tower on private land can be enough for a single first-floor window. It is not enough for a painted gable, a 3-storey terrace, or anything over a pavement. We will not hire a tower as a workaround for a job that needs an independent scaffold. That is how people fall, and how we lose the argument with the insurer.
How long the painter needs it
Prep is the slow part: wash, scrape, fill, dry. The colour going on is quick. Weather stops gloss and masonry paint the same way it stops render. A week on paper is tight for a whole house; two to three weeks is the conversation we have more often. Weekly hire is on the sheet.
Quick answers
Can my decorator supply the scaffold?
Some do, as a tower. If the job needs an independent scaffold, inspected while it is up, that is us. Split kit on one elevation is how edges get missed.
Do you scaffold just the fascia?
If that is genuinely all the work, a short elevation at eaves height can be enough. If they then ‘while we’re up there’ the windows, you needed the fuller job. Tell us the real list.