New bathroom - is a deposit normal?

[LadyNellCardross]

So after saving hard for a while I am finally getting our family bathroom done. It's a big job involving ripping out a 40 year old bathroom and I've chosen to go with a local, long established company. They've done work for a friend and she was happy with their work. Unfortunately, due to lockdown, the work had to be put off from the summer until approximately February. I got a revised quote by email yesterday and at the end it said I need to pay a deposit of £4000. The total cost will be £10000. Does that sound reasonable and normal? I'm worried about what might happen if the company was to get into difficulties between now and February. I just wondered whether other people have experience of this?

I got my bathroom done in November last year. Got the usual quotes and at no point was I asked for a deposit. Pay only on completion and you are satisfied with the work. £10,000 is steep but I was about £7,000

Thanks Ludo19. It is a lot of money but the work will also include things like insulating the ceiling and the eaves, rewiring everything, plastering walls etc. I got several quotes and they all came in around the same price. So I think it's a reasonable quote but a deposit wasn't mentioned until yesterday. DH says if we pay it and they go under before Feb we're stuffed. They seem quite busy with lots of work lined up but I've been screwed over in the past by a dodgy kitchen company.

Material costs are rising, sometimes drastically! However, my dh does not ask customers for a deposit. As you’ve said, what if the company goes bust? Agree £10,000 seems expensive for a new bathroom. I’d probably get quotes again and go from there ...

We have just started our kitchen with the same local company that did our bathroom. We pay 50% of the materials costs before booking the date, 50% on completion and the labour is payable to the kitchen fitters. We put the deposit on our credit card as an extra layer of protection but I have no concerns, they want to make sure that they don’t buy the materials and book off the date for you to back out and leave everyone with a free slot or materials they don’t need since they are self employed.
We paid £5000 for our new bathroom (walls knocked through so the shower is built into the wall, very large room) and are paying £8000 for our kitchen so £10,000 seems steep to me but it depends on the design obviously

Thankyou everyone for your replies. I did consider that they may think I wasn't fully committed to using them and can understand they might be worried that I'd leave them with a large materials bill. I'm just unsettled by the fact a deposit wasn't mentioned at any stage. If I put it on the credit card it might be possible to claim it back if something untoward was to happen.