Fascias, Soffits & Guttering · Weston-super-Mare & North Somerset
Fascias, Soffits & Guttering In Weston-super-Mare
Is water going over the edge instead of down the pipe?
The unglamorous edge of the roof, which is where flat roofs actually fail
On a pitched roof, guttering is a tidy-up. On a flat roof it is part of the waterproofing, because a flat roof has no slope to fall back on and the water leaves at a small number of specific points. Block one of those and the roof does not drain slowly, it stops draining. Everything then sits there working away at the laps and the upstands until something gives. This is why we treat the whole edge - the outlet, the trim, the gutter, the downpipe, the fascia behind it and the soffit under it - as one system rather than as roofing plus an afterthought. It is the least interesting page on this website and it is where a genuinely large share of the leaks we attend actually begin.
Free Fascias, Soffits & Guttering Quote
Four boxes and one of us will come and stand on it. Surveys are free, we do not do the three-hour kitchen-table sales pitch, and if your roof has another eight years in it we would rather tell you that than sell you one you do not need.
1,000+
Flat roofs laid, patched or rescued
Houses & Units
Domestic and commercial, same crew
Written Down
Guarantee on paper before we start
Nothing
What it costs to get us on your roof
Why Use Us For Fascias, Soffits & Guttering In Weston-super-Mare?
The outlet gets treated as roofing
The point where the covering meets the drainage is a waterproofing detail, and it wants dressing properly rather than sealing hopefully. It is also the first thing we check on any leak.
The whole run gets cleared
Clearing a gutter and leaving a blocked downpipe achieves nothing. We follow it through to the gully at ground level, which on the older properties around here is frequently where the actual blockage has settled.
The fall gets put back
Brackets sag over the years, especially where the timber behind them has softened. A run that has gone level, or is quietly tipping the wrong way, holds water and spills at every joint along it.
Salt-resistant fixings
This coast eats ironmongery. Using fixings specified for a marine environment costs pennies more and is the difference between rainwater goods that last twenty years and ones that start dropping brackets in year eight.
Repair before replacement
A weeping joint, one cracked length, a bracket that has let go - those are repairs. Nobody here is going to quote you a full replacement system for a run that needs three union seals and an hour of somebody's time.
The rot behind gets found
Brackets screw into the fascia. If that board has gone soft, new brackets have nothing to grip. Being up there is also the best look anyone gets at the edge of your roof covering, and whatever we can see, you get told about.
"A surprising number of the damp walls we get asked about in Weston are not roof leaks at all. They are a gutter joint that has been dripping onto the same square foot of render several thousand times a year."
Based on the fascias, soffits & guttering jobs handled by RPS Flat Roofing
How A Fascias, Soffits & Guttering Job Runs
Tell Us What It Is Doing
Where the mark is, when it started, and whether it gets worse in wind or only in long rain. Those two behave differently and it narrows things down before anybody fetches a ladder.
Somebody Stands On It
One of us comes out, gets up there, and walks the whole roof rather than the corner you pointed at. Free, and with no expectation it turns into work.
A Look Underneath As Well
Where there is a ceiling void or a loft hatch, we look at the deck from below too. Half of what matters on a flat roof is invisible from the top.
The Diagnosis, Then The Price
You get told what has failed and why, in words you could repeat to somebody else, before any number is mentioned. Photos where they make it clearer.
A Quote You Can Take Apart
Deck, insulation, membrane, trims and access all listed separately. If you only want part of it done, you can see exactly what that part costs.
Strip Back To Sound Timber
The old covering comes off and the deck gets checked properly. Anything soft comes out. Laying a new membrane over damp boards is how a ten year roof becomes a three year roof.
Falls Before Finish
If the water has nowhere to go, it is going to sit there whatever we cover it with. Firrings or tapered insulation put a proper slope back before the membrane goes anywhere near it.
Water On It Before We Leave
Outlets tested, edges and upstands checked, everything swept up, photographs sent over and the written guarantee handed to you on the day.
What Our Guarantee Actually Covers
Every flat roof in Weston is guaranteed by somebody. Read the small print and you usually find the promise is from the company that made the rubber, not the company that stuck it down. That distinction matters, because membranes almost never fail. Installations do. A sheet of EPDM will happily outlive all of us sitting in a warehouse. It fails at the upstand where somebody rushed the corner.
So RPS Flat Roofing splits the two and tells you both. The materials carry whatever the manufacturer offers, which depends on the product going on your roof - and you are told which product that is, by name, before you agree to anything. Separately, the workmanship carries our own written guarantee, handed over on the day, in language you could read out to a neighbour.
The reason we are relaxed about putting that in writing is that most of the flat roof failures we get called to were decided before the covering went on. Water was never given anywhere to go, or the old deck was left in place because lifting it would have shown up something awkward. Get the falls and the deck right and the covering is the easy part. Get them wrong and no warranty document in the world keeps your ceiling dry.
In Writing
Our Workmanship
Named Product
Maker's Own Cover
Covered
Public Liability
1,000+
Flat Roofs Done
What To Look For In A Fascias, Soffits & Guttering Firm
Ask whether the timber behind is sound
This gets missed constantly. Guttering hangs off the fascia, and a fascia that has been wet for years will not hold a screw. Anybody willing to hang a brand new system off rotten boards is arranging for you to pay for the same job twice, and the second time will include the boards.
Ask what happens at the outlet
On a flat roof the outlet is a waterproofing detail rather than a plumbing one. It needs the covering dressed properly into it and, on most roofs, a leaf guard so it does not silt up. If a quote treats it as just a hole with a pipe under it, the roof will be draining through hope.
Ask why replacement, not repair
Plastic rainwater goods are cheap to buy and quick to fit, which makes full replacement an easy thing to sell. There are genuine reasons for it - brittle lengths, discontinued profiles, wholesale sag. Ask which applies to yours. Quite often the honest answer is a morning's work and a few seals.
Sorting What Is There Against Replacing The Lot
| Comparison point | Fascias, Soffits & Guttering | Full Replacement |
|---|---|---|
| What you spend | £90 to £350 clearing, sealing, rehanging | £700 to £2,000 on a typical house |
| Time | A morning, usually | One to two days |
| The right call when | It weeps, sags or is simply blocked | Brittle, cracked, or the fascia has gone |
| The fascia behind | Left alone if it is sound | Nearly always done at the same time |
| What it buys | Years, on a system that is basically fine | 20 to 25 years in uPVC |
| Disruption | Almost none | Ladders or scaffold, and a skip |
The Green Stripe Down Your Wall Is The Cheap Part
You can see the algae running down the render and it looks like a cosmetic annoyance. It is not. Behind that stripe the wall is saturated, and a wet wall pulls heat out of the building all winter, so you are quietly paying to warm damp masonry every time the heating comes on. On this coast there is a second problem stacked on top: salt-laden air plus permanently wet walling is exactly the combination that lifts render and blows the face off brickwork, which is a considerably larger bill than a gutter. And then there is the timber. Water tracking down a wall eventually finds the wall plate the roof structure sits on, and rot there turns a guttering problem into a structural one with an entirely different price tag attached. All of it starts with a blockage that costs under a hundred pounds to clear, which is the most annoying sentence on this website and also the truest. If the water is not getting to the gutter in the first place because the roof itself has stopped draining, that is covered on the repairs page instead.
See what a flat roof costs in WestonWhat Fascias, Soffits & Guttering Costs In Weston-super-Mare
Clearing gutters and outlets on a typical Weston house is £90 to £180. Repairs - new union seals, a replacement length, rehanging a run that has dropped - generally land between £120 and £350. Replacing fascias, soffits and guttering across a standard semi is more often £700 to £2,000 depending on the run length, the height and how much of the timber behind needs doing. On a flat roof we would always look at the outlet as part of the same visit, because the two problems are usually one problem.
See The Full Cost GuideFascias, Soffits & Guttering - Your Questions
How often should flat roof outlets be cleared?
Once a year as a minimum, and twice if there are trees anywhere near - which around Hutton, Congresbury and the wooded lanes towards Winscombe is most properties. It is a small job that prevents a large one. On a flat roof it matters far more than on a pitched roof, because there is no slope to carry water away once the outlet stops working.
It is clear and it still overflows. What now?
Then the fall has gone. Brackets sag over time, particularly where the fascia behind them has softened, and a run sitting dead level or tipping the wrong way will pond and spill at the joints. Rehanging the run to restore a consistent slope is the fix, and it is a repair rather than a replacement.
Do you replace fascias and soffits as well?
Yes, and on a flat roof job it often makes sense to do it while access is already there. If the boards have gone soft there is no point hanging new guttering off them, and the two jobs together cost meaningfully less than the same two jobs six months apart.
Why does my downpipe keep blocking at the bottom?
Usually the gully rather than the pipe. Silt, leaf mulch and moss wash down and settle where the water slows, which is at the bottom. It backs the whole run up regardless of how clean the gutter above it looks, which is why we always follow it down to ground level rather than stopping at the top of the ladder.
Can you match my existing guttering?
Usually. Common profiles are still widely available, and on the postwar stock around Worle, Milton and Bournville it is rarely a problem. Older or unusual sections are occasionally discontinued, in which case we will tell you honestly whether it is worth hunting down a match or simply replacing the full run.
Is it worth adding a leaf guard?
On a flat roof outlet, yes, almost always - the consequences of a blockage are so much worse than on a pitched roof that the small cost is easy to justify. On gutters generally it depends on what is overhanging. Under trees they help. In the open they can sometimes catch debris that would otherwise have washed straight through.
While you are here: Flat Roof Repairs ·Commercial Flat Roofing
Where We Work
Fascias, Soffits & Guttering across Weston-super-Mare and out through North Somerset - Worle and Milton, the village cores at Uphill, Hutton and Bleadon, the new streets at Locking Parklands, and down onto the levels towards Highbridge and Burnham.
What People Say Afterwards
Flat roofing is a trade people only think about when something has gone wrong, so the bar is low and the horror stories are plentiful. Here is what customers around Weston and the levels have said about getting it done properly.
Two firms had already patched the same corner of our extension roof and both times it came back by Christmas. Ricky got up there, came down, and said the problem was that the water had nowhere to go - the whole thing sat in a dip. They rebuilt the falls and put rubber over it. Third winter now, still dry, and I have stopped keeping a bucket in the airing cupboard.
Ours is a bungalow near the old village so it is nearly all flat roof, and the salt off the Channel had eaten the edge trims to nothing. Quoted properly, itemised, and the price at the end was the price on the paper. They also spotted that the outlet had been fitted higher than the deck by whoever did it in the eighties, which explained a great deal.
New-ish house, flat canopy section over the front, leaking at one corner. I was braced for being told the whole lot needed replacing. James looked at it and said it was a single lap that had never been properly welded, charged me a fraction of what I had budgeted, and was gone by lunchtime. Genuinely refreshing.
We wanted the garage roof done and were dreading the whole business. Charlie turned up when he said he would, explained the difference between the warm and cold deck options without making us feel thick, and let us take a week to think about it with no chasing phone calls. The crew swept up so thoroughly you could not tell they had been.
We run a unit and the roof had been leaking over the racking for the best part of a year. They worked around us, did the noisy part on a Saturday so we never lost a day's trading, and the report they sent afterwards was detailed enough that our insurer accepted it without a single follow-up question. Cannot ask for much more than that.
I had put off dealing with the dormer for years because every quote I got was for the entire roof. RPS were the only ones who separated out what actually needed doing from what would be nice to do eventually. They did the dormer, told me the main covering had a good few years left, and did not once try to talk me into the bigger job.
Get A Price For Fascias, Soffits & Guttering
Ring and describe what it is doing, or send a message and one of us will come and stand on it. Surveys are free, the number we write down is the number you pay, and if the honest answer is that your roof has another five winters in it, that is what you will be told.