Hiring a tradesman is one of the few decisions where getting it wrong can cost you thousands of pounds, weeks of stress, and sometimes serious safety risk. And unlike buying a car or a laptop, most people only do it a few times a year, so the pattern-recognition never really builds up.
The good news is that the signals separating a proper tradesman from a chancer are consistent, and once you know what to look for they show up in the first phone call. This is the checklist we'd want a family member to use if they were hiring us or anyone else.
The paperwork test
Everything a good tradesman does generates a paper trail, and every part of that trail should be available to you on request. Specifically:
Public liability insurance
Ask for the certificate. £2 million is a common minimum and £5 million is standard for anyone doing renovation work. If they can't email it to you the same day, they either don't have it or don't have it in date.
A written quote before work starts
Not a verbal figure over the phone, not a scribble on the back of a business card. A written quote should list what's being done, what's included and excluded, how much it costs, what the payment terms are, and how long the price is held for. If a tradesman won't put a number in writing, they're leaving themselves room to change it.
Receipts for materials
You should get copies of the receipts for anything you're being charged for as materials. Nothing dodgy about a small handling margin on top — that's normal — but the underlying receipts should exist and be shareable.
A proper VAT position
Businesses turning over more than the VAT threshold (currently £90,000) must charge VAT. A larger renovation job that mysteriously doesn't include VAT usually means one of two things, and neither of them is your problem to solve, but both should make you wonder what other corners are being cut.
The right qualification for the right job
Handyman work covers a wide range, but some parts of it are legally regulated and you need to check the qualification specifically. Signage on the van isn't enough — always ask for the registration number and, for anything above the smallest jobs, look them up.
- Gas Safe registration for any work on gas appliances, gas pipes, flues, or boilers. Non-negotiable and easy to verify at gassaferegister.co.uk.
- Part P competent person status for notifiable electrical work in dwellings — anything in kitchens, bathrooms, gardens, or involving the consumer unit. Common schemes are NICEIC, NAPIT, ELECSA and Stroma.
- A waste carrier licence if the tradesman will be removing waste from the property. Fly-tipping is the tradesman's problem legally, but it can become the homeowner's problem practically if the waste is traced back to your address. Ask for the licence number.
- Water Regulations qualifications for anything touching the mains water supply.
A handyman doing general repairs doesn't need all of these, but they should know which qualifications apply to which parts of a job and bring in the right subcontractor when the job crosses into regulated territory.
Damp and mould
This is worth calling out separately because it's where the industry has historically been at its weakest, and where the legal expectations are shifting fastest.
Since Awaab's Law — introduced following the death of two-year-old Awaab Ishak from prolonged exposure to mould in his family's social housing — social landlords in England have statutory timescales to investigate and remedy damp and mould hazards. The scope is being extended, and the direction of travel for the private rental sector is clearly the same. Landlords who wait until it becomes law to change how they respond to damp complaints are going to get caught out.
For homeowners this matters too, because the wrong response to a damp patch is one of the most common ways a small problem becomes a serious one. Painting over mould with anti-mould paint doesn't solve anything. Neither does buying a dehumidifier and hoping. Damp and mould are symptoms, and a competent tradesman diagnoses the cause — condensation, penetrating damp, rising damp, plumbing leak, cold bridging, ventilation failure — before they touch the surface.
Ask specifically: how would you approach diagnosing this? If the answer is a treatment before an investigation, that's the wrong answer.
When to end the conversation
Some patterns show up again and again in tradesman disputes, and they're worth knowing so you can walk away early.
The cold caller
Anyone knocking on your door offering to fix your roof, tarmac your drive, or trim your trees while they "happen to be in the area" is running a script. There are no exceptions to this. Reputable tradesmen have full diaries; they don't need to knock on doors.
Cash only
A cash discount is fine for small jobs and often reasonable. A refusal to accept anything other than cash means someone doesn't want the payment showing up on their books. That's not just their problem — if something goes wrong, you have no paper trail and no consumer protection.
Pressure on price and time
"I can do it today if you decide now" and "the price goes up tomorrow" are sales tactics, not tradesman tactics. Anyone rushing you to commit before you've thought about it is doing so because thinking about it would change your mind.
Vague scope
"Whatever it takes, we'll sort it" sounds reassuring and reads terribly on an invoice. The scope is where the money is. If it's not defined in writing, it will be defined by whoever wants the higher number when the job ends.
No fixed address, no landline, only a mobile
Not automatically damning — plenty of good sole traders work off a mobile — but combined with any of the above it's a strong signal to pause.
A large deposit before materials are on site
A modest deposit for a large job is reasonable, and materials paid up-front is normal on bespoke items. A demand for a big chunk of cash before anything has been ordered or scheduled is a well-known scam pattern.
Questions worth asking before you hire
- Can I have a copy of your public liability insurance certificate?
- Can I have this quote in writing with a scope of works and price breakdown?
- Are you Gas Safe / Part P registered (as applicable)? What's the number?
- What happens if the job takes longer than quoted?
- What's your process if something goes wrong after the job is finished?
- Who's actually going to do the work — you personally, or a subcontractor?
- Can I speak to a recent customer for a reference?
The answers matter less than how comfortable the person is answering. A tradesman who takes these questions in their stride is one who gets asked them often, because they work with people who care about doing it properly.
What a good quote looks like
A proper quote for a job of any size includes: your name and address, the tradesman's business details and insurance number, a clear scope of what's included, a clear scope of what's excluded, the total price with VAT stated explicitly, the payment terms and schedule, an estimated start date and duration, and a period the quote is valid for. Extras and variations should be quoted separately as they come up, not folded into a running total.
If you get this, you're in good hands. If you get "£1,200 all in, cash on completion" and nothing else, you're not.
The bottom line
Good tradesmen make the paperwork side easy because they've done it a thousand times. Anyone who makes it hard, or who bristles at reasonable questions, is telling you what they think about accountability. Pay attention when they do.
Frequently asked
Do handymen need to be qualified?
For general repair work, no formal qualification is legally required, but for gas work (Gas Safe), notifiable electrical work (Part P), and waste removal (waste carrier licence), specific registration is legally required. A trustworthy handyman knows which parts of a job cross those lines.
What's Awaab's Law and does it apply to private landlords?
Awaab's Law introduces statutory timescales for social landlords in England to respond to damp and mould hazards, following the death of Awaab Ishak in 2020. The legislation currently applies to social housing, with an expected extension to the private rental sector under consideration. Any landlord operating today should be aligning their damp and mould response with the same standards regardless.
Should I ever pay a tradesman in cash?
For small jobs it's fine. For anything larger, use bank transfer or card so you have a paper record, and always insist on a receipt. Cash-only for a large job is a warning sign.
What insurance should a tradesman have?
At minimum, public liability insurance — £2 million as a floor, £5 million for anyone doing structural or renovation work. If they employ anyone, employers' liability insurance is also legally required.
How much should I pay as a deposit?
For most jobs, no deposit at all. For jobs involving bespoke or non-returnable materials, a deposit to cover those materials is reasonable. Any deposit above 25% of the total on a standard job is worth questioning.