How to Choose a Tree Surgeon in Cumbria — What to Look For and What to Avoid

June 23, 2026

Tree surgery is not a regulated profession in the United Kingdom. Unlike electricians, gas engineers or structural engineers, there is no legal requirement for a tree surgeon to hold any qualification, any insurance or any certification before they can offer their services to the public. Anyone can buy a chainsaw, put an advert on a local Facebook group and call themselves a tree surgeon.

Most people do not know this, and it matters. A poorly executed tree surgery job can damage or kill a tree, cause serious injury to the operative or bystanders, damage property, create legal liability for the landowner, and in the case of protected trees, result in criminal prosecution. Choosing the right contractor is genuinely important, and it is worth knowing what to look for.

Qualifications That Actually Mean Something

The main professional qualification for tree surgery operatives in the UK is the NPTC (National Proficiency Tests Council) award, which is now administered by City and Guilds. The relevant units for chainsaw and tree surgery work are:

CS30 and CS31, covering the safe use of a chainsaw and the felling and processing of trees
CS38, covering the use of a chainsaw from a rope and harness for aerial tree work
CS39, which covers specific aerial chainsaw techniques

A reputable tree surgery contractor will have qualified operatives holding the appropriate certificates for the work they are carrying out. It is entirely reasonable to ask to see copies of these certificates before commissioning any work, particularly for aerial or felling operations. We carry our certificates and are happy to show them.

Beyond the NPTC qualifications, the Royal Forestry Society and the Arboricultural Association both offer professional membership routes that indicate a higher level of knowledge and commitment to professional development. A company or individual holding ARB Approved Contractor status from the Arboricultural Association has been assessed against a defined standard of competence and professionalism.

Insurance

Any reputable tree surgery contractor carries full public liability insurance. This protects you as a client in the event that damage is caused to your property, or injury to a third party, during the carrying out of the work. Without this insurance, if a branch falls on your car or through your neighbour's greenhouse during a job, there may be no route to compensation.

Ask for evidence of public liability insurance before any work begins. A legitimate contractor will provide this without hesitation. The level of cover should be appropriate for the scale of work; for domestic tree surgery a minimum of five million pounds is standard, and larger commercial and estate contracts may require ten million pounds or more.

Red Flags to Watch Out For

Years of working in this industry across Cumbria have given us a clear picture of the warning signs that indicate a contractor is unlikely to deliver a good job. These include:

Offering to do the work immediately, on the same visit as providing the quote, without carrying out any formal assessment of the tree. This is a sign that the assessment is being skipped, not that the contractor is efficiently organised
Quoting a very low price for significant work without visiting the site. Meaningful tree surgery cannot be accurately priced without seeing the tree and the access conditions
Being unable or unwilling to provide evidence of insurance or qualifications when asked
Proposing to top the tree, meaning cutting all branches back to stubs, rather than carry out proper pruning to BS 3998 standards
Offering to take cash only with no paperwork. This is not necessarily a sign of poor workmanship but it does raise questions about accountability
Door-to-door cold-calling, often with a story about having wood to chip or being in the area and noticing your tree looks dangerous. Legitimate tree surgeons do not generally need to knock on doors to generate work
No written quote or method statement provided before work begins on anything beyond a very small job

What a Proper Quote Should Include

A written quote for tree surgery work should specify what work is being carried out, on which tree or trees, to what standard, what will happen to the arisings, and what the total price is. For larger jobs it should also confirm the qualifications of the operatives carrying out the work and the level of public liability insurance held.

We always provide written quotes before any work begins. If a contractor is unwilling to put their quote in writing, that is a warning sign in itself.

Checking Tree Preservation Order Status Before Booking

One practical responsibility that often falls to the landowner rather than the contractor is checking whether a tree has a Tree Preservation Order before commissioning work. A good contractor will check this as part of their assessment, and we always do, but if you commission work on a TPO tree without consent, it is the landowner rather than the contractor who faces the criminal liability for the offence.

We check TPO status on every site visit, advise clients on their position and handle all consent applications on their behalf. See our TPO page for more information.

Why We Think You Should Ask These Questions of Us Too

We would rather lose a job to a competitor because a client asked us hard questions and chose someone else on a legitimate basis than win work from clients who did not know they should be asking. The industry as a whole is better when clients ask good questions, because it rewards contractors who invest in qualifications and insurance and makes life harder for those who do not.

Ask us about our qualifications. Ask for our insurance certificate. Ask us to explain exactly what we are going to do and why. We will answer all of it.

Phone/WhatsApp: 07376804724
Email: enquiries@maxreynoldstreeservices.com

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