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HSE's position on aerial tree work is blunt: it is a hazardous occupation resulting in many injuries each year, a minimum of two people must be present during all aerial work, and one of the ground team must be available, competent and equipped to do an aerial rescue without delay. The same guidance says that chainsaws should never be used off the ground unless the operator has been adequately trained in safe working techniques. A climber working alone in a garden is not a cheaper version of a proper crew; it is a job with no way of getting an injured person out of the canopy.

For chainsaw work generally, HSE puts the duty in plain terms: by law, chainsaw operators must have received adequate training relevant to the type of work they undertake, and they are also required to wear appropriate chainsaw protective clothing whenever they use a chainsaw. Its published material includes INDG 317 on chainsaws at work and AFAG 308 on top-handled chainsaws, which is the compact saw used aloft and the one that rewards a lack of training most quickly.

So the practical checks are simple to make on the phone. How many people are coming. Which of them stays on the ground. Is that person trained in aerial rescue and does the rescue kit travel with the van. A firm that finds these questions odd has told you something useful before anyone climbs anything.

The Lifting Operations and Lifting Equipment Regulations 1998, usually shortened to LOLER, place duties on people and companies who own, operate or have control over lifting equipment, and HSE sets out exactly what counts in arboriculture: rope access and work positioning systems including anchor points, ropes, karabiners, harnesses and strops; rigging systems for lowering branches; mobile elevating work platforms; cranes; and tree spades. It adds the detail that decides everything else, which is that the term load includes a person.

From that flow requirements a customer can actually see. All lifting equipment and accessories must be clearly marked to show their safe working load, and rigging gear should be marked to show that it is not designed to carry people. The main climbing rope and associated equipment must be inspected every day by a competent person, arborists should be trained to carry out a daily pre-use check, and for items subject to high wear and tear such as ropes a written weekly record of inspection should be kept. Lifting equipment used to lift loads also requires thorough examination by a competent person, and a report of that examination has to be available.

The subtlest part is that the anchor points in the tree are themselves part of the lifting equipment. HSE expects arborists using rope access or work positioning to be trained to select suitable anchor points, to recognise the differences between tree species, and to understand the effect of age, condition and disease — which is why rigging out of a decayed stem is a specific concern rather than a general one. LOLER sits alongside the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999, the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998 and the Work at Height Regulations 2005, whose Schedule 5 covers rope access and work positioning.

Where arboricultural work, on the ground or in the air, is proposed within 10 metres of an overhead line, HSE says specialist advice and guidance must be sought from the owner of the power line, the Network Operator, before any work is undertaken within that distance. Its guidance on the subject is GS6, Avoiding danger from overhead power lines. The first choice when managing electrical risk is to carry out the work dead, with the line switched off, and where that is not possible the work has to follow procedures set up by the Network Operator using appropriately qualified and competent people.

In a garden this usually means the job cannot happen on the day it is quoted. The operator has to be contacted, an outage or a shrouding arranged, and a date agreed, which takes time that a keen contractor may be reluctant to mention. A branch touching a service cable into the house, a line crossing the back garden to a pole, and a conductor running over the hedge are all in scope. Treat any offer to work close to a line without involving the network as a reason to stop the conversation, not a reason to be grateful for the speed.

Tree work is priced on risk and on handling, not on the size of the tree alone. What moves a figure is the height and the species, whether the crew can fell or must dismantle, what sits underneath the canopy, whether a platform can reach the base or the work has to be done on ropes, how far the timber and brushwood must be carried to the van, whether a chipper can stand on the drive, how much of the day is lost to protecting a pavement or a neighbour's roof, and whether an overhead line means a third party has to be involved before anyone starts. A two-hour reduction and a two-day dismantle can stand in the same garden.

LokalMatch is the introduction and nothing more. You describe the tree once — rough height, position, what is beneath it, how the garden is reached — attach your postcode, and tree firms working in your area contact you themselves. It is free for homeowners; the professionals pay for the requests they receive. LokalMatch does not carry out tree work, does not set prices and does not vet, rank or recommend anybody who gets in touch, so the crew size, the insurance and the equipment records are yours to compare alongside the number.