Air Conditioning Installation

Most people start looking into air conditioning installation in London during the first properly hot week of the year, and quickly discover that quotes from different air conditioning companies vary by more than a thousand pounds for what looks like the same job. That gap is rarely about the units. It is about whether the installer surveyed the property or guessed, whether the price includes the electrical work and making good, and whether they intend to size the system for the room or for the invoice.

This page explains exactly what we install, how the process runs, what drives the cost, and what to check on any quote — including ours.

We fit the three system types that cover almost every London property, and we will tell you plainly which one suits yours rather than defaulting to the most expensive.

Single split systems

One indoor unit paired with one outdoor condenser. This is the standard choice for a bedroom, home office or living room, and it is the most common residential air conditioning install we do in London flats and terraces — the job most people mean when they ring up and ask for aircon. The indoor unit is usually wall-mounted high on an outside-facing wall; floor-standing and ceiling cassette versions are available where a wall mount would look wrong.

Multi-split systems

Two to five indoor units running from a single outdoor condenser, each controllable independently. This is the sensible option once you want more than one room cooled, because you only need one outdoor unit and one set of external pipework — which matters a great deal in a flat, a conservation area, or anywhere the freeholder is unenthusiastic about condensers on the elevation.

Ducted and concealed systems

Where the units themselves need to disappear — a period property, a high-specification refurbishment, or a room where nothing can go on the wall — we install ducted systems concealed in a ceiling void or bulkhead, with only slim grilles visible. These cost more and need to be designed in alongside building work, so they suit projects that are already in progress.

Brands we fit

We install Daikin, Mitsubishi Electric, Panasonic, LG and Samsung. All five are genuinely good; the differences that matter in practice are indoor unit noise levels, controller quality and parts availability rather than headline efficiency. If you want to compare specifications yourself before we visit, Daikin UK publishes full product data for its domestic range, and Mitsubishi Electric does the same. We are not tied to one manufacturer, so we specify whichever unit fits the room and the budget.

Six steps, the same whether it is one unit in a flat or five across a house. You always know what happens next and what it costs.

1. 01

   Free site survey

   We measure the heat load of each room properly — glazing, orientation, insulation and how the space is used — rather than sizing from floor area.

2. 02

   System design

   We agree indoor unit positions, the pipe route and where the outdoor condenser sits, checking noise, access and any freeholder consent you'll need.

3. 03

   Fixed written quote

   One price covering equipment, labour, materials, electrical work, commissioning and making good. Nothing is added later.

4. 04

   Fitting day

   Dust sheets down, core drilling done cleanly, pipework run in trunking or concealed where possible, and the property tidied before we leave.

5. 05

   Commissioning

   Pressure test, vacuum, charge, then run the system through cooling and heating modes and record the readings on your paperwork.

6. 06

   Handover and warranty

   We show you how to use the controller properly and register the manufacturer warranty on your behalf, typically five to seven years.

Two identical-looking London homes can produce quotes hundreds of pounds apart, and it is almost always one of these five things:

• Pipe run length. The distance between the indoor unit and the condenser drives materials and labour more than any other single factor. A first-floor bedroom with the condenser directly outside is cheap; the same unit with a run down through the house to a rear garden is not.
• Condenser access. A ground-floor garden position is straightforward. A flat roof, a balcony, or anything needing scaffolding or a cherry picker adds real cost.
• Electrical work. Most systems need a dedicated circuit from the consumer unit. Whether your board has a spare way — and how far it is from the condenser — changes the figure.
• Building fabric. Core drilling through a solid Victorian wall takes longer than through a modern cavity, and period properties more often need concealed routing rather than external trunking.
• System capacity. A 2.5kW unit for a bedroom against a 7kW unit for an open-plan kitchen-diner is a meaningful difference in equipment cost — which is precisely why sizing should follow a heat load calculation, not a guess.

We have written all of this up with actual London figures in the air conditioning installation cost guide. It is worth reading before you collect quotes, not after.

The outdoor unit is where the paperwork lives. For most houses it falls under permitted development, but that permission comes with conditions on the size of the unit, where it can sit, and the noise it may generate at the boundary. The Planning Portal's guidance on adding air conditioning to your home sets out those conditions in plain terms and is the definitive reference.

In London three situations come up constantly. Conservation areas and listed buildings routinely need consent for anything visible from the street. Flats and maisonettes usually need freeholder or management company approval, which can take weeks — so start it early. And where a condenser will sit close to a boundary, it is worth a conversation with the neighbour before installation rather than a complaint after it.

We flag every one of these at survey stage. We would rather delay a job by a fortnight than fit a system that has to come off the wall.

We survey before we price. Any quote given over the phone without seeing the property is a guess, and guesses get corrected upwards once the engineer arrives.

One fixed written price. Equipment, labour, materials, electrical work, commissioning and making good, all in one figure agreed before we start.

REFCOM registered. Refrigerant handling is regulated, and our registration is independently audited — worth confirming with any contractor you are considering, not just us. It also means the F-Gas paperwork your annual service depends on is done properly from day one.

We fit systems we can maintain. Because we also handle repairs and servicing across London, we specify equipment we can get parts for quickly — not whatever was cheapest at the wholesaler that week.

Domestic and commercial specialists. The same team handles a single bedroom unit in a home and a commercial office installation. If your project is really a heating project, we will say so and talk you through air source heat pumps instead.