Terms & conditions

Appointment Terms and Conditions

The agreed price for your sweeping appointment includes:

A visual external inspection of the chimney stack /flue
A safety assessment of the hearth and the room
An assessment of the stove to check for wear and tear, safe operation, or the need for replacement parts (stoves only).
A rotary power sweep of the flue.
A Type 2 smoke test post-sweep to check the drawing efficiency.
A sweep certificate for insurance purposes

Price Terms:

We estimate that the appointment should take no more than 30-45 minutes (per chimney). However, the £75 allows for up to an hour.
If we find anything that needs additional work (e.g. significant tar deposits) then we may charge £20 per additional 30 minutes thereafter. However, we would always let you know first.
If you are not in when we arrive and the appointment is missed, we reserve the right to charge 50% of your agreed price.
We will bring a card reader to take payment on the day.

Before Your Appointment:

Please let us know if there are any issues with parking. There is a lot of equipment to carry, and we need to park as close to the house as possible.
If you have used your fireplace before the appointment, it must be totally cleared of any hot embers or ashes. If possible, please don’t use it in the 24hrs before the appointment.
Please clear a space in front of your fireplace for us to work; ideally 2m x 2m.
Our full sweeping disclaimer can be found below.

Chimney Sweeping Disclaimer

Your chimney will be brush-swept in accordance with the national standard. The following disclaimer applies. This is also documented on the post-sweep certificate.

Material information should always be disclosed to us. E.g. recent chimney fires, fuels used etc. We can only use the current information, when shared, to advise on the condition of your chimney or appliance
Whilst every care is taken to prevent damage to your property, we cannot be held responsible for poorly maintained chimney stacks, pots, cowls or any other part of your chimney or property
Chimneys are affected by the way they are used, the weather, and many other conditions which may not be known to us
If we are not able to investigate any inaccessible or concealed areas of the flue, then we cannot warrant that there are no potential defects in the flue or chimney
If a CCTV investigation has been carried out, any comments and opinions expressed within the certificate are made in good faith but may not be definitive. The information must not be relied upon in any way
The smoke evacuation test does not guarantee the integrity of the chimney
Loose liner material (pargeting) may continue to drop, no matter how often the chimney is swept
Very tarry chimneys present a higher risk of chimney fires, and may require chemical intervention. Please check with your liner manufacturer that they approve the use of chemicals before using them. Serious cases may need re-lining
Regular chimney sweeping is important to protect you and your home
If you have any safety concerns, please talk to us and we will advise you accordingly
The sweeping certificate is not a guarantee or warranty that any fireplace, heating appliance, boiler, flue or chimney stack is safe

PRIVACY POLICY

Step In Time Chimney Services Privacy Policy

Introduction

Karl Maguire is trading as Step In Time Chimney Services (Karl Maguire, we or us). This Privacy Policy explains what information we collect about you and why, and how we store that information.

For the purposes of the applicable data protection laws (the UK General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), together with any implementing legislation, in particular, the Data Protection Act 2018), the person responsible for your personal information is Karl Maguire.

This Policy applies to information obtained by us through your use of our website (stepintime-chimneyservices.com), and other means as set out below, and as part of our general interactions with you during your appointment booking and certification process.

Collection of your Personal Information

We collect information that, alone or in combination with other data, could be used to identify you (Personal Information), such as your e-mail address, name, physical address, and telephone number. We will collect your Personal Information in several ways, including when you contact us through the Website, by telephone, WhatsApp, e-mail, or via our Facebook or Instagram business account pages.

Use of your Personal Information

We collect and use your Personal Information as necessary to perform our services for you, and for our legitimate business interests, including to:

Operate the Website
Understand and improve how our users use and interact with our services
Communicate with you about the services you have booked (e.g., appointments, booking reminders and follow-up information), as well as respond to requests for assistance that you have made to us
Request a review for the service provided to you (a review is required as part of your Checkatrade guarantee)
Communicate any essential safety notices that may be applicable to a service or product we have delivered for you
We do not run any direct marketing campaigns or share any of your Personal Information with third parties for marketing purposes
With your consent, we will also contact you with regards to booking your next chimney sweeping appointment when that is due.

Storage of Personal Information

We will only hold your Personal Information on our systems for the period necessary to fulfil the purposes outlined in this Policy, or until you request that the information be deleted in accordance with your right of erasure (see "Your rights" section below). Even if we delete your Personal Information, we reserve the right to maintain a copy for legal, tax or regulatory purposes; but in such event, we will do so only as long as necessary to fulfil those legal, tax or regulatory purposes.

Personal Information access and disclosure

We will only disclose Personal Information to third parties when:

We use sub-contractors, where required, to assist us in providing our agreed services to you and meeting operating needs. For example, additional labour may be required as part of an installation service; in which case we may be required to share your name and physical address so that any personnel can find the required place of work by themselves. These service providers may only access, process or store Personal Information pursuant to our instructions and to perform their duties to us, and in accordance with applicable laws and regulations; or
We have your explicit consent to share your Personal Information; or
When we determine that disclosure is required to protect the rights, property, or personal safety of Karl Maguire, or anyone else associated with the business (Step In Time Chimney Services), or to respond to lawful subpoenas, warrants, or requests by public or regulatory authorities, including requests by law enforcement authorities.

Use of cookies

Our website uses ‘cookies’. Cookies are small text files that can be used by websites to make a user's experience more efficient. Cookies are uniquely assigned to your computer and can only be read by a web server in the domain that issued the cookie to your computer.

The law states that we can store cookies on your device if they are strictly necessary for the operation of this site. For all other types of cookies, we need your consent.

We will place the following cookies:

Strictly necessary cookies. These are cookies that make our website usable by enabling basic functions like page navigation, server balancing, and allowing us to differentiate between humans and bots. The website cannot function properly without these cookies.

We may place the following cookies with your consent:

Analytical / Statistical / Performance cookies. These are cookies that allow us to recognise and count the number of visitors and to see how visitors move around the Website when they are using it. This helps us to improve the way our Website works, for example, by ensuring that users are finding what they are looking for easily. All data is collected and reported on anonymously.

We are not currently using the following cookies:

Functionality cookies. These are cookies that are used to recognise you when you return to the Website. This enables us to remember your preferences (for example, your choice of language or region).
Targeting / Marketing cookies. These cookies record your visit to the Website, the pages you have visited and the links you have followed. We will use this information to make our Website more relevant to your interests.

If you want to check or change what types of cookies you accept, this can usually be done within your browser settings. If you do not want to receive cookies, please decline the cookies in the cookie pop-up banner that appears when you first use the Website. This will not disable necessary cookies.

Data security & integrity

We are committed to taking reasonable and appropriate steps to protect our systems and the Personal Information that we hold from misuse, loss, or unauthorised access. Our Website is securely hosted. If you suspect any misuse or loss or unauthorised access to your personal information, please let us know immediately.

However, while we do our best to protect your Personal Information, we cannot guarantee the security of all data which is transmitted to the Website via the internet or similar connection.

Your rights

Under the data protection law, you have various rights in relation to your Personal Information, including:

Your right of access - You have the right to ask us for copies of your Personal Information.
Your right to rectification - You have the right to ask us to rectify Personal Information you think is inaccurate. You also have the right to ask us to complete information you think is incomplete.
Your right to erasure - You have the right to ask us to erase your Personal Information in certain circumstances.
Your right to restriction of processing - You have the right to ask us to restrict the processing of your Personal Information in certain circumstances.
Your right to object to processing - You have the the right to object to the processing of your Personal Information in certain circumstances.
Your right to data portability - You have the right to ask that we transfer the Personal Information you gave us to another organisation, or to you, in certain circumstances.

Please note that these rights are subject to certain limitations set forth in applicable law.

You are not required to pay any charge for exercising your rights. To exercise these rights, please contact us at info@stepintime-chimneyservices.com or 07376 35 24 37.

We will seek to deal with your request without undue delay, and in any event in accordance with the requirements of applicable laws. Please note that we may keep a record of your communications to help us resolve any issues you raise.

Complaint resolution

If you believe that we have not complied with this Policy or your data protection rights, you can make a complaint to us. Please contact us at info@stepintime-chimneyservices.com or 07376 35 24 37. You also have the right to file a complaint with the UK Information Commissioner’s Office. However, we hope that you'll attempt to resolve the complaint with us first.

The ICO’s address is:

Information Commissioner’s Office

Wycliffe House

Water Lane

Wilmslow

Cheshire

SK9 5AF

Helpline number: 0303 123 1113

ICO website: https://www.ico.org.uk

Third party advertising

We do not operate any advertising on third party websites after you have visited our Website.

Links to third party websites

Our Website includes links to other websites whose privacy practices are not under our control. If you submit Personal Information to any of those websites, your information is governed by their privacy policies. We encourage you to carefully read the privacy policy on any website that you visit.

Change to this Policy

We will occasionally update this Policy to reflect company and customer feedback. We encourage you to periodically review this Policy to be informed of how we are protecting your Personal Information.

Contact information

We welcome your comments regarding this Policy. Please contact us at info@stepintime-chimneyservices.com or via the telephone 07376 35 24 37.