Book the time. We’ll do the most useful thing with it.

We can’t promise the whole garden in two hours, because we haven’t seen it. Your helper will tell you what’s realistically achievable when they arrive, and you decide what matters most. If you’d rather we looked first, ring us and we will.

Straight away — you choose the day and start time in the calendar when you book. What we then promise is a four-hour window around that time, with your helper messaging you the day before to narrow it down. We work that way because a fixed time we can’t keep is worse than an honest range — and it means your helper isn’t rushing the job before yours to get to you. We email you your helper’s name once they’re confirmed, and a reminder the day before.

Use the Book with your credit button in your welcome email, any monthly credit email or your members’ page. You pick the service, the hours and a start time exactly as above, but nothing is taken when you book. Within a minute your monthly credit comes off first, at our standard rates, your 5, 10 or 15% comes off anything beyond it, and only what is left is charged to the card you joined with. You get an itemised email showing what was used and what you have left. Please don’t use the ordinary calendar above for member bookings — it charges the standard rate and your credit would sit there unused.

Ring us or send us a message and we will look for something that does. And if we genuinely can’t cover a time you have booked, you get a full refund — you have paid for hours, and hours we can’t deliver are hours you get your money back on.

Your helper will say so rather than quietly carry on. They send a request with the price to whoever booked, and nothing extra is done or charged unless it is approved in writing — usually a tap on a link in a text or email. Extra time is the same hourly rate, charged afterwards. Nobody works on and bills you for it later.

Lots of our bookings are made by family who live further away. Book as normal and choose Someone else on the booking form. Give us their name and phone number, confirm they know about the visit and are happy with it, and, if you like, choose a code word for the helper to say at the door. You stay in charge of the booking: you get the confirmation, the helper’s name, and any request for extra time to approve, and nothing extra is ever agreed with the person at home behind your back. They always have the final say on the day — if they don’t want the visit, the helper leaves and we ring you. If a visit can’t go ahead like that, or we can’t get in, we charge only the minimum time the first two times and the full booking from the third (Booking Terms section 6). Our helpers never provide personal care or medication, and never handle cash, cards or passwords. More in section 15 of our Booking Terms.

Your helper will ask what else would be useful — there is almost always something. The booked time is the minimum charge, because it’s what kept someone’s day free.

Some jobs are a different job once you see them. Anything needing a Gas Safe engineer, a certified electrician, a chainsaw, roof access or a ladder above single-storey height, your helper will stop and tell you. You’re charged for the time they were there, and we’ll point you at someone who can do it.

Tell us in the notes when you book how your helper gets to the work. If nobody’s there and access wasn’t arranged, the time is charged — someone kept that window free for you.

Rare, but possible. You’ll hear from us at least 48 hours before with other windows to choose from, or a full refund, whichever you prefer. We’d rather refund you than send someone who isn’t right for the job.

Move or cancel free up to 24 hours before your window, using the link in your confirmation email. Inside 24 hours we may charge half the booked value, because the time has been held and other work turned down. Full detail in our Booking Terms.

Because you booked online, you have a statutory right to cancel within 14 days. Most bookings happen sooner than that, so at checkout we ask you to confirm two things: that you want us to start inside those 14 days, and that you understand you cannot cancel once the work has been fully carried out. If you cancel part-way through, you pay only for the time already worked. Without those two confirmations we would not be able to start for a fortnight, which is not what anyone wants. The full wording is in our Booking Terms.