The morning after a gale, most people do the same thing: step outside, look up and hope. Sometimes the damage is obvious, with tiles on the lawn and a ridge line that no longer runs straight. More often it is subtle. A few tiles have lifted and settled back, a flashing has peeled at one corner, a gutter has been wrenched off its brackets, and nothing shows until the next heavy rain finds the gap. A post-storm inspection is about catching that second kind of damage early, recording it properly and making the roof safe before a small problem turns into a wet ceiling. This page covers what you can safely do yourself, what to record for your insurer and what a roofer checks on the roof itself.
This page is about the inspection itself; what to do first in the hours after damage, including making safe, is in our guide to storm damage to roofs.
Safety comes before everything
Do not go onto the roof, and do not lean a ladder against a wet roof edge in high wind. Storm-damaged roofs hide loose tiles, weakened battens and slippery surfaces, and the greatest danger is falling. Our guide on inspecting your own roof safely sets out why even confident people should stay on the ground.
Walk the outside of the house with care. Debris can still be loose overhead, so do not stand beneath damaged chimney stacks, leaning aerials or hanging gutters. Keep children and pets away from fallen tiles and broken glass, and treat any fallen cables as live until proven otherwise; call the electricity network operator rather than touching them. If a section of roof has collapsed, if you can see daylight through the ceiling or if a chimney has shifted, keep out of the room below and call for help.
What you can check from the ground
With binoculars or the zoom on a phone, look along each slope from a safe distance and from more than one angle. You are looking for the line of the roof, the pattern of the tiles and anything out of place.
- Gaps or darker patches in the tile pattern, where tiles have slipped or blown off.
- A ridge or hip line that dips, shifts or shows a gap between the tiles and the bedding.
- Verge tiles lifted or missing along the gable edge, where wind gets underneath first.
- Chimney pots, caps or the stack itself leaning, cracked or shedding mortar.
- Lead or metal flashing curled, lifted or missing around chimneys and walls.
- Gutters sagging, detached or full of tiles, and fascias or soffits pulled away.
- Debris on flat roofs, such as branches, and anything stuck in outlets.
- Trees and fences that have moved, because a fallen limb may have struck the roof without leaving a mark visible from the ground.
Check the garden and the neighbours' too. Tiles and fragments on the ground tell you which slope has lost covering, and the pieces help a roofer match the type.
What to check inside
Go into the loft with a torch, taking the care described in our guide to inspecting your loft. Look for daylight where there should be none, damp patches or drips on rafters and felt, wet or flattened insulation and a torn or displaced underlay. Check the ceilings on the top floor for new stains and the corners of rooms for damp. If it is still raining, put a bucket under any drip, move belongings and switch off lights fitted in a ceiling that is dripping or bulging.
Photograph everything, including the things that look minor. A single tile on the path may be the only external sign of a bigger area of disturbed covering above. Timing is important here, because evidence disappears quickly. Rain rinses stains, tiles get cleared away and temporary repairs cover the damage. A set of dated photos, taken before anyone touches anything, is the foundation of a claim.
Making the roof safe
If water is coming in, the priority is to stop further damage. A roofer can fit a temporary cover: a tarpaulin secured over the damaged area, battened down so it does not blow off, or a few tiles replaced to close the gap. This is a holding measure, not a repair, and it should be done with the right access equipment. We prioritise emergency calls and will make a leaking roof safe first, then plan the lasting repair once it is dry; our emergency roof repairs page describes how that works.
Keep every receipt for emergency work. Most home insurance policies expect you to take reasonable steps to prevent further loss, and the cost of doing so is often recoverable, but the policy wording governs this, so check it or ask your insurer before spending much. Do not throw away damaged materials until the insurer has said whether they want to see them. Put pieces of broken tile, bent flashing or snapped timber in a safe place and photograph them with the roof.
What a roofer checks on the roof itself
A storm inspection goes further than a look from below, and on the roof the work covers each part in sequence. Tiles are checked for cracks, slips and lifted corners; on interlocking concrete tiles that means checking the headlock and the clips that hold the edges; on slate it means looking for slipped slates and corroded fixings. Ridge and hip tiles are tested for movement, and the bedding or dry-fix system is checked. Verges and eaves are examined, because wind tears at the edges first. Lead flashings are inspected for lift and tears, particularly around chimneys, and the chimney stack is checked for cracked flaunching and loose pots.
Valleys, where two slopes meet, are cleared and checked for displaced debris and splits. Flat roofs are checked for membrane tears, lifted edges, damaged trims and blocked outlets. Rooflights and roof windows are checked for cracked glass, displaced seals and damaged flashings. Rainwater goods, fascias and soffits are examined, and satellite dishes, solar panels and aerials are checked for their fixings, since wind catches them like sails. Throughout, the roofer photographs each defect with a marker for location, so the report matches the insurer's questions.
Underlay and battens are harder to judge. Where the covering has been disturbed, tiles may be lifted in the affected area to see whether the felt is torn or the battens split. It is better to check than to cover over a hidden fault, and the same visit can often include a temporary fix. Our short piece on hidden roof damage describes the faults that do not show from outside.
Storm damage and wear and tear
Insurers draw a line between sudden damage caused by an event such as a storm and gradual deterioration caused by age or poor maintenance. Home insurance is generally designed to respond to the first and not to pay for the second. That is why the cause matters so much. A roof that lost tiles because the fixings had corroded may be treated differently from one where sound tiles were lifted by a gust. The honest approach is to describe what happened and what the roof looked like, and let the evidence speak.
A good inspection helps in both directions. It separates storm damage from existing wear, which makes the claim clearer and more credible, and it identifies maintenance items you should fix at your own cost. Check your policy for the excess, for definitions of storm and for any conditions about roof condition or the age of the property. The report we produce is built to be passed to your insurer: our page on roof reports for insurance claims explains what goes into one. We do not decide your claim, and we do not promise an outcome, but we can supply clear photographs and a written finding.
The notes worth writing down
Photos carry most of the weight, but a few lines of written notes make them far more useful. Record the date and time the storm hit and when you first noticed damage, roughly what the wind and rain were doing, and which rooms are affected. Note who you spoke to at the insurer, on what day, and any reference number they gave you. Write down each temporary measure, who did it and what it cost. If a neighbour's roof or a fallen tree played a part, mention that and photograph the tree or fence where it stands.
Take a wide photo of each elevation of the house first, then close-ups of every defect, then interior shots of stains with a coin or a tape measure in the frame to show scale. Shoot from the same spot again once repairs are done. Together the notes and pictures let a loss adjuster follow the story without a site visit, and they let a roofer price the repair without guessing. If you are unsure whether something counts, photograph it anyway; a spare picture costs nothing.
Beware the doorstep caller
After a widespread storm, unknown traders often knock on doors offering to fix roofs on the spot, sometimes pointing out damage that they claim only they can see. Be cautious about anyone who pressures you to agree to work immediately, asks for payment up front in cash or declines to put a price in writing. Take your time, ask for photos of the damage on your own roof, and ask for a written quote. You are entitled to compare. Our approach is the opposite: a free survey, photos of your own roof and a fixed written quote, with repair where repair works.
After the immediate work
Once the roof is safe and the claim is under way, plan the permanent repair. Match replacement tiles carefully, since old tiles weather and a new batch may differ in colour. Ask for the loft and gutters to be checked while the roofer is there. Keep a record of the repair with photographs, and file it with the report. If the same part of the roof fails in every storm, ask why; a pattern points to a weakness in fixings, batten spacing or detailing that is worth correcting. For an inspection after a storm, ring 01256 213956 and send photos of what you can see by WhatsApp, and read more about our service on the roof inspections in Basingstoke page.
