Measuring for carpet - big discrepancy between my measurement and the shops surveyor (large chain)?

[DueInSeptember]

I've just had someone out now to measure up for a carpet for my stairs and landing. His quote seemed quite a lot (he didn't actually give me the measurement, I may go into the shop to ask for this), so I decided to measure myself and there is quite a big difference in price when I try and work it out.

It's over a third more.

Any hints and tips on what I could have done wrong?

Is it patterened? You may need more to make the patterns match when fitting.

But I know nothing about this, why not ring them and ask?

Does the quote include underlay and fitting?

I accounted for the underlay and the fitting is a seperate charge. It is patterned (stripes).

Thanks very much by the way.

There are various points in this article, do any apply to you?

Remember the carpet is a particular width, usually 4 or 5 metres wide, so you could end up with wastage.

What you need to do is measure up all your different parts (make sure you measure right into doorways), then draw them onto a plan (like a jigsaw) making sure they are all running the right way.

For a long run of stairs, you don't need to have one continuous length, they can join in the middle.

I would ask how they worked the price out.

Thanks everyone, I've had a chat with my husband and we're going to go into the store tommorow and ask what the actual measurement is. I'm going to provide our measurements of the stairs and landing and ask why it's so different. Hopefully they can shed some light on it.

Thanks for your help.