First off I would give 6 stars if I could, fantastic technical delivery and a pleasure to work with!

The Job:
Dormer Loft Conversion over main roof and off shot and kitchen side return extension.

Quote Process.
We spent a long-time gathering quotes and researching companies. Having done a number of extensions, renovations and conversions myself I am pretty experienced and knowledgeable so this was quite an involved process. My wife spent a lot of time on Mumsnet, NappyValley and other review sites checking company reputations.
W Design and Build were suggested through an old friend of my wife who did residential property development professionally; although he had never used them himself he had heard good things.
Radek was very astute during the quote process and asked all the right questions about techniques and preferences so that he could provide an accurate quote. I had a mix of 3 other types of companies who quoted: Type 1 were pretty superficial with the quote and gave the impression it would all be super straight forward and offered quite low prices. My wife’s research later revealed these companies would get the job started and then discover “complications” that hadn’t been factored in and jack up the price. Type 2 over-estimated the complexity and came in with very high quotes. Type 3 like W Design and Build were the sensible ones with detailed quotes and reasonable prices.
Of the sensible quotes W Design was initially the second highest quote from the 5 on the shortlist (though they were all quite close). As we had a personal recommendation and I had a good feeling about the guys I went back to them and they shaved a bit off the price and included some extra finishes which were initially outside the spec. This made them very competitively priced and combined with the response from the two references we checked and how impressed I was with Radek’s knowledge and experience we agreed the job.

The Job:
All the work was done by Radek, Donald and their own team (except the skimming which is pretty standard to subcontract). Radek and Donald were on site every day working themselves

as well as overseeing their team. They were reliable, punctual and polite (Donald’s soothing tones helped reassure our nervous party wall neighbour!) They adapted well to complications like the discovery of an unmapped sewer pipe that was unearthed during excavations and a significant miscalculation by the architect, quickly finding pragmatic solutions and not using it as an excuse to add costs or try to charge for lost time. They communicated well at the right times to ensure we were all on the same page about design decisions and were quick (and didn’t complain) to make small changes where we felt something wasn’t quite right. In the end we added a complete bathroom strip out and remodelling because we were so impressed with them. We also asked them to lay a specialist vinyl flooring we had bought for the kitchen as the quote we had from the supplier seemed quite high. To their credit, they said they had not used this range of products and chemical adhesives before and would rather turn down the money than take on a job which they couldn’t guarantee would be perfect.

They finished the job ahead of schedule and to be honest exceeded their spec, such was their pride in what they were doing.
The work was always going to be messy, but they did their best to keep it contained and diligently cleaned up as best they could at the end of each day.

Payment:
We agreed to an initial sum for scaffolding and materials then 2 week increments with the final invoice due 14 days after completion (for snagging in case any leaks appeared, electrics stopped working, etc.) Which they never pressured us to accelerate.
All in all Donald and Radek provided a great experience and delivered a fantastic job. I remember early on in the job I said “Radek I think we have a problem” to which he replied cheerfully “One problem is no problem….10 problems, then we might have a problem!” Which I think summed up his ever positive and enthusiastic personality perfectly.