Oven cleaning around Royal Oak W2, taking in the Hallfield Estate, Bishops Bridge Road and the Westbourne stucco conversions. A single oven is £77.
Royal Oak is the least used station on the Hammersmith and City line, sitting quietly between Westbourne Park and Paddington, and most people only meet it because they live in the triangle behind it. That triangle is the Hallfield Estate: 15 blocks over about 17 acres south of Bishops Bridge Road, designed by Tecton under Berthold Lubetkin and finished by Lasdun and Drake across 1951 to 1958. The blocks are named after Great Western Railway stations out of Paddington. Marlow, Exeter, Tenby, Reading, Taunton.
A listed estate means old kitchens
Most of the Hallfield buildings went Grade II listed in June 2011, and the estate has been a conservation area since 1990, so the kitchens stay modest with a freestanding cooker or a slot-in. Those are singles at £77. The six-storey blocks like Clovelly and Worcester have galley kitchens where the cooker is boxed in tight both sides, which is the layout where lifting the racks out to the van beats scrubbing them at the sink.
The Westbourne stucco houses are a different job again. Four and five storeys, white fronts, carved into flats, and the top-floor conversion often has a compact single while the garden flat has a range at £114.
Where the van goes
W2 is outside the Congestion Charge but inside the ULEZ, so the charge that matters here is Westminster's, and their controlled parking hours are posted zone by zone. Bishops Bridge Road is busy and the estate roads are permit-only. We pay for a bay. No call-out fee inside the North and South Circular, and no premium for a W2 postcode.
- Dip tank
- A heated soak tank in the van. Racks, shelves, trays and side runners go in it, not in your sink.
- Non-caustic indoors
- The cavity, fan cover and door glass are degreased by hand with products that leave no smell.
Who tends to ring
Westbourne ward had a population of 12,759 at the 2011 Census, packed into a small area north of the Westway, and a good share of it rents. Foxtons and the Bayswater independents turn flats over constantly, so end-of-tenancy cleans are steady. If your flat has an extractor over the hob, the extractor hood clean is £28.
| Single oven | £77 |
| Double oven | £110 |
| Range cooker, 90cm | £114 |
| Two-oven AGA | £143 |
| Hob | £23–28 |
| Extractor hood | £28 |
| Microwave | £22 |
Do I need to be in for the whole job?
Yes, someone needs to let us in and be there at the end for the heat test.
How long does a single take?
About ninety minutes. A double is nearer two hours.
Is the price really fixed?
Yes, quoted on the phone, and it does not move when we see the oven.
Reviews from our rounds
Nice hardworking lads that always do a good job. We used them for our old flat when moving out and for the new one now, both jobs were done very professionally. My wife is very impressed with the results and would recommend them to friends and family.
Brilliant clean, my oven looks like brand new. A 5 star clean.
Very satisfied with the service. They were slightly late at first but I got a call from customer service to let me know, and it was all fine. The oven man, as he called himself, arrived and worked very hard for a couple of hours. My oven now looks like it has never been used.
Where Royal Oak sits
Close to Royal Oak
Woolwich · Southwark · Temple Fortune · Avery Hill · Bucks Hill · Dollis Hill
More of our London patch
Parsons Green Redbridge Finsbury Park South Beddington Yeading Istead Rise Savile Row Mitcham Common Stonebridge Park Cripplegate Bethnal Green South Brixton Hutton Woodford Green Green Park Westbourne Park Hillingdon Penge and Cator Coombe Harold Park Highams Park Beckenham Hill North Cray Spitalfields
Call 020 8077 5225 and the Royal Oak price is fixed on the spot; typers can use the quote form instead.