Commercial Gutter Cleaning in Lancashire

The county has more old roof than new

Lancashire commercial property is a mix of Victorian mill, 1980s steel portal frame and modern distribution shed, and each one blocks in its own way. Mills have cast iron valley gutters between slate slopes that fill with moss. Portal frame units have long box gutters with a handful of outlets doing all the work. New sheds have internal runs and syphonic drainage where a single blocked outlet takes out the whole roof.

What they share is that nobody sees the gutter. On a house you spot an overflow from the drive. On a 200 metre unit at Whitebirk or Walton Summit the first sign is a wet patch on an internal wall in November, by which point the water has been getting in for weeks.

Why an internal gutter is a different risk

An eaves gutter that blocks spills down the outside wall and stains the cladding. A box or valley gutter that blocks fills up, goes over the upstand and drops inside the building onto stock, racking or a suspended ceiling. That is the difference between a cleaning job and an insurance claim, and it is why commercial gutter clearing is priced on the runs rather than on the size of the building.

We clear the whole length, not just the accessible ends, and we clear every outlet, sump and hopper, because a clean gutter with a blocked outlet is still a tank.

How we clear them across Lancashire

High-reach vacuum systems from the ground do most of the work: safer than height access, quicker, and no scaffold or hire costs on the quote. A camera on the pole shows what is in the gutter before we start and the clear run afterwards, and those images come to you with the job sheet.

Where the roof cannot be reached from the ground we price a MEWP, scissor lift or tower into the job up front. Downpipes that will not pull clear are jetted or rodded. Everything that comes out leaves site with us rather than going in your bins.

RAMS, permits and working around the site

Risk assessments, method statements and our public liability documents go over before the visit, so the facilities manager, landlord or health and safety officer has them on file. Where a site runs permits to work, we work to them.

Scheduling is the other half of it. Retail parks and shop fronts get done out of hours, schools and colleges in the holidays, distribution centres at night or on a shift change, care homes at quiet times. Across Lancashire that means one team covering Blackburn, Burnley, Preston, Chorley, Lancaster and the coast without the job interrupting the business.

How often, and what a sensible schedule looks like

Twice a year suits most commercial premises: once after leaf fall, once in spring once the moss has come off the pitched sections. Buildings with trees close by, flat roofs that collect silt, or any history of water getting in are better quarterly.

Most clients put the gutters on a schedule with the rest of the exterior after the first clean, so cladding, car parks, glazing and solar are picked up on the same programme. See commercial exterior cleaning for the full list.

What it costs and how to get a price

The price comes from the length of the runs, the height, the access, how much is in there and how the waste is handled. Anything larger than a single unit gets a site survey first, then a fixed price with the scope written down. Multi-site portfolios are quoted as one programme with a schedule per building.

Send the site address, or a list of them, and we will arrange the survey. Houses and small premises are covered on the domestic gutter cleaning page instead.

Questions Lancashire clients ask

Do you cover the whole county? Yes, from Rossendale and Blackburn across to Preston, Chorley, Lancaster and the coast, with one team and one schedule rather than a different subcontractor per site.

Can you do several buildings on one contract? That is most of our commercial work. Portfolios are surveyed building by building, then run as one programme with a visit schedule for each site and a single point of contact.

What if a gutter needs repairing rather than clearing? We photograph it, tell you plainly, and leave it to your roofer. Clearing a split gutter is a waste of your money and we will say so.