Storm Damage Repair In Merseyside: What To Do First

By Chris, owner of Everlast Roofing North West (20+ years on Merseyside roofs) · About Everlast Roofing · Last updated 2026-09-01

Merseyside does not get many named storms, but it does not need them. The wind that comes across the Irish Sea and up the Mersey finds every slate that has weathered loose, every ridge tile on tired mortar and every lead flashing that was already on its last winter. The morning after a hard blow, my phone does not stop.

Most of what people ring about is not as bad as it looks from the pavement, and a fair bit of it is not storm damage at all. But what you do in the first day genuinely changes what it costs, both in repair and in what an insurer will pay. Here is what actually happens to Merseyside roofs in a storm, what to do about it in order, and what each repair runs to.

Storm Damage Repair: What To Do In The First 24 Hours

Order matters here, and most people get it wrong by starting with the insurer rather than the water.

• Stay off the roof. Wet slate at pitch is lethal and there may be more loose material up there. Nothing on that roof is worth a fall.
• Contain the water inside. Bucket under the drip, move what you can, and if the ceiling is bulging with trapped water, pierce it deliberately in one spot with a screwdriver over a bucket. A controlled hole beats the whole ceiling coming down.
• Photograph everything before anyone touches it. Close-ups of each fault and a wide shot of the whole elevation. Note the date and the weather.
• Get it watertight. A temporary cover stops the damage spreading. Keep the receipt, because insurers expect you to mitigate and will usually pay for it.
• Then call the insurer. Not before. You want photographs and a temporary fix in place first.

The one thing I would add is about who you let up there. After every storm, vans appear in Merseyside offering to sort roofs cash in hand. Some are fine. Plenty are not, and the ones that are not will find several thousand pounds of work that does not exist, take a deposit, and be gone. Nobody legitimate needs to knock on your door the morning after a storm.

If water is coming in as you read this, that is what an emergency roof repair is for. Temporary cover first, proper repair scheduled after, and the photographs taken in between.

Common Types Of Roof Storm Damage In Merseyside

Storm damage here is rarely dramatic. You are not usually looking at half the roof in the garden. It is four faults, over and over.

Damage	Where it happens	Urgency
Slipped or missing slates	Exposed edges, above bays, gable ends	Days, unless water is entering
Cracked or lifted ridge tiles	Along the ridge where mortar has weathered	Urgent if loose, it can fall
Stripped lead flashing	Chimneys, valleys, abutments	Urgent, it leaks immediately
Debris impact damage	Anywhere, from aerials, branches, fence panels	Depends on what it broke

Two things are worth understanding about all of these. The first is that wind almost never creates a fault from nothing. It finds one. A slate that comes off in a gale was already loose, usually because the nail had rusted through. That matters because it is exactly the argument an insurer will make.

The second is that the leak rarely appears under the hole. Water runs along the underside of the slate and the timber before it drops, so a wet patch above the landing can easily be a fault two metres away above the bedroom. Do not let anyone quote from the position of the stain alone. For the insurance side of all this, our guide on what storm damage insurance covers on Merseyside slate roofs covers the wear-and-tear line in detail.

Emergency Storm Damage Repair And Temporary Weatherproofing

There is a difference between a genuine emergency and a job that needs doing soon, and knowing which you have saves money.

A genuine emergency is water actively entering the building, a ridge tile or slate that is loose and could fall on a pavement or a car, or a hole big enough that the next shower will soak a ceiling. That gets same-day or first-thing-next-morning attention and a temporary cover.

Not an emergency is two slates off a rear slope with no water coming in, a gutter knocked askew, or a cracked slate that is still sitting in place. Those want doing within a couple of weeks, and paying an emergency rate for them is money wasted.

Temporary weatherproofing usually means a heavy-duty tarpaulin battened down over the affected slope, or on smaller faults a self-adhesive flashing patch. It is not a repair and it is not meant to last. What it does is stop the damage spreading into plaster, insulation and ceilings while the proper work is organised and, if you are claiming, while the insurer catches up.

Keep the invoice for the temporary works separate from the permanent repair. Insurers treat mitigation costs differently, and having them itemised separately makes that part of the claim much simpler. Every emergency call we attend gets photographed before the cover goes on, precisely so there is a dated record of what was underneath it.

Storm Damage Repair Cost In Liverpool And Merseyside

These are the figures I quote locally. They assume normal two-storey access and no scaffold licence for a main road.

Storm damage repair	Typical cost	Worth claiming?
Emergency temporary cover	£150 to £350	Claim as mitigation, keep receipt
Replace a few slipped or missing slates	£180 to £400	Usually below the excess
Re-bed or replace ridge tiles	£200 to £500	Borderline
Renew lead flashing to a chimney	£300 to £700	Often worth it
Re-slate a storm-stripped section	£600 to £1,500	Yes
Debris impact, structural	£1,000 upwards	Yes, always

The column on the right is the one people overlook. Most single-storm repairs on a Merseyside terrace land between two and five hundred pounds, and a typical buildings excess is two hundred and fifty. Once you factor in losing your no-claims position and the premium increase that follows, paying outright is frequently cheaper than claiming.

Check your excess before you pick up the phone to the insurer. If the repair is four hundred pounds and your excess is two-fifty, a claim recovers a hundred and fifty pounds and costs you your no-claims. That is rarely a good trade. Where it changes is anything structural, anything involving several elevations, or anything over about a thousand pounds.

How Storm Damage Repair Is Carried Out

Worth knowing what should happen, because it is how you tell a proper job from a patch.

• Survey and photograph first. Every fault recorded close up before anything is touched, plus a wide shot of the elevation.
• Make safe. Anything loose that could fall comes down or gets secured before other work starts.
• Temporary cover if needed, so the building is watertight while materials are sourced.
• Match the materials. On a Merseyside slate roof that means matching the slate size, thickness and colour. Reclaimed Welsh slate on a Victorian terrace, not a modern substitute that will stand out from the street.
• Repair, not bodge. Slipped slates refixed properly with hooks or lead tingles, not smeared with mastic. Ridge tiles re-bedded on fresh mortar, not sealed over.
• Photograph on completion and hand over the record with the invoice.

The mastic point is the one to watch. Sealant over a storm-damaged slate or a lifted flashing is a two-year fix at best, it makes the proper repair harder later, and it is the clearest sign of a job done in a hurry. If someone shows you a tube of sealant as the solution to a stripped lead flashing, get another quote.

Matching matters more than people expect on the period terraces around Liverpool. A patch of bright modern slate in the middle of a hundred-year-old Welsh slate roof is visible from the pavement and it will come up when you sell. Our slate and tile roofing work uses reclaimed matched slate as standard for exactly that reason.

How To Prevent Storm Damage Before Winter

Almost every storm repair I do was preventable, because the wind found something that was already failing. An autumn check costs a fraction of a winter emergency.

• Look at the ridge from the ground with binoculars. Crumbling or missing mortar between ridge tiles is the single most common thing that turns a gale into a bill.
• Check the lead around the chimney. If it has lifted at an edge or the mortar chase has weathered out, the next storm will take it.
• Clear the gutters and outlets. Blocked gutters in a downpour back water up under the bottom course of slates.
• Watch for slipped slates after every blow, not just the big ones. One slate down in October is a two hundred pound repair. The same roof in February with three winters of water in the timber is not.
• Trim back anything overhanging. Branches over a roof are the most common cause of impact damage on the leafier Merseyside streets.

The properties that suffer worst here are the exposed ones: end terraces, corner plots, and the coastal stretches out through Crosby and Southport where there is nothing between the roof and the Irish Sea. If that is you, an autumn inspection is worth doing every year rather than every few.

A roof inspection with photographs before the weather turns gives you two things: a list of what needs doing while it is still cheap, and a dated record of the roof in good condition. That second one earns its keep, because it is the evidence that defeats a wear-and-tear argument if you do end up claiming later.

We cover storm work across Liverpool, Bootle and the wider Merseyside area. Call Chris on 07933 828 045 and he will tell you over the phone whether what you are describing needs someone out today or can wait until the weather passes.

• Stay off the roof after a storm; wet slate at pitch is lethal and more may be loose.
• Photograph close-ups of each fault plus a wide shot of the whole elevation, and note the date.
• Contain water inside first, then get temporary cover, then call the insurer.
• Keep the temporary works invoice separate; insurers treat mitigation costs differently.
• Check your excess: most single-storm repairs land between two and five hundred pounds.
• Never accept mastic over a stripped flashing or a slipped slate; it is a two-year bodge.
• Match reclaimed slate on a period terrace, or the patch will be visible from the street.
• Nobody legitimate knocks on your door the morning after a storm.

Frequently Asked Questions

For more local roofing advice, browse the Everlast Roofing blog or call Chris on 07933 828 045.