Builders in the house during lockdown?

[McCorona]

Have been waiting for a builder to come and do 2-3 weeks of work on our house, inside and out, for some time. We've had a leak (now patched) so there is work to do on the roof from outside, but also damaged ceilings and plaster to replace inside, plus necessary redecoration. He's just phoned to say he has a cancellation and could start on 1st Feb.

DH thinks we should seize the chance to go ahead but I can't bear the idea of doing so when we are trying to homeschool and WFH and we aren't even allowed to leave the house for a bit of respite. It's a small and crowded terraced house with one loo, so it's not as if we could lock ourselves in another wing - it will mean camping out on sofas, sharing bedrooms and piling up the contents of affected rooms in every available space.

We live in a part of east London that has been badly affected by Covid and I also hate the idea of builders spreading their germs all over my kitchen, bathroom and bedrooms when we've been so careful for so many months.

Am I being unreasonable? I know work in the home isn't allowed in Scotland but unfortunately it is in England, where I live.

Suggestions on how we might mitigate the effects / risks if we do go ahead are also gratefully welcomed.

I believe you are allowed to temporarily move out in these circumstances. I was talking (across the road from one pavement to the other) about this with the landlady of our local pub, they are still able to provide overnight accommodation for essential reasons.

But we're all working from home and need desks and wifi - we couldn't all do it from a hotel room or AirBnb. Plus we have pets to consider, and not ones that I could farm out.

It is a risk from covid point of view but it's not the kind of work that is against the rules and I would personally go ahead and do it. The benefits of doing it now are that you WFH. When WFH arrangements will stop you'll probably have to be taking lots of time off work to be able to keep an eye on the builders.

One of you stay at home with the pets and the other (I’d suggest you, as you appear to be the most anxious) decamp with the DC to an AirB&B. It will have decent WiFi, they all do nowadays, and for a couple of weeks surely you can manage to work from a table. Then get your place professionally cleaned once the work is done (which it will need anyway if it’s being plastered and sanded etc.

The AirBnb idea is great but too expensive I think - there's nowhere within a reasonable distance of here under £200 / night. I think I'll just have to grin and bear it and keep in mind how great it will feel when they've gone! Anyone had builders in in times of Covid? Are they generally considerate?

I've just (almost!) finished a 4 months renovation, but I didn't move in until recently, meaning they worked in an empty house. Not sure what you mean by considerate and what you expect. My builders didn't exactly want to catch covid themselves either. They're definitely more at risk than the likes of me who are lucky to be able to work from home. One of the builders had covid mid-project so had to self isolate and not work for 2 weeks and everyone else tested for covid because of this but it all came back negative for everyone else. The most painful part was unpredictable, random delays with materials and products.

We had builders in and it was okay! I set out the tea/coffee/jug of milk and everything seperate for them with wipes and sanitiser next to the kettle and told them to help themselves. I stayed seperate and kept a mask on however I said they were free to decide what to do with theirs. I then had all the windows and doors open!