A. The prices given on our item pages are to hire the item for a standard hire period of 72 hours. This is to give you ample time to set up before your event and to pack away afterwards. I’ll mention it here, and it will be repeated further down, but never ever take delivery of your items on the day of your event. It is a complete nightmare for both of us. Should you need to hire items for a longer period we can offer extended hire prices – for longer than a week please contact us on 0800 910 1015 for a quote.

A. All orders will be delivered and collected by a single driver. If you have ordered large items, such as fridges, you or someone representing you will have to be there to help the driver unload. The driver has 15 minutes to either deliver or collect your order, if it takes him longer then you will be charged £12.50 per additional 15 minutes. If a driver arrives and there is no one available to help him then he may not be able to deliver or collect.

If yours is a large order, a challenging location or you know that there’ll be no one around to help you have to let us know at least three days prior to delivery.

Our delivery service is subsidised, the amount you pay does not cover the fuel, wages, insurance and cost of van. Sometimes our drivers have to do 15 drops in a day, if an order causes a driver to be delayed this has a knock on effect for other customers.

A. We do, but there’s an additional charge of £20 per delivery or collection.

A. We’d love to but we can’t, sorry. About a third of all of our orders are to charity events, if we gave all of these discounts then we’d be bankrupt within 3 months. We pick four charities to work with each year, after this we have to operate a strict no policy. Despite how worthwhile and fantastic your charity is.

A. The short answer is no. All items go through our commercial dishwashers and are checked to make sure they're perfectly clean before being sent out, however this does not mean that glasses or cutlery will arrive at your venue polished. The only way to properly polish these items is by hand, as you can imagine given the prices we charge and the number of items we supply this is impossible. If you're having a formal occasion then we suggest you set aside some time during setup to give these items a little polish, if you need to.

A. Our standard hire period is 72 hours, this is usually Friday to Monday. Should you require catering equipment or exhibition furniture for longer, then provided the availability is there we can accommodate that, although extra fees will be applicable. For every extra day on hire, past the 3 then the additional cost is 20% of the hire total. This is calculated automatically on the checkout page when you input your required delivery and collection dates.

For longer term arrangements, please contact is on 0800 910 1015 for a quote.

A. The sooner you place your order, the better.

Stock is limited and at certain times of the year, certain stock can become very popular – for example barbecues in the summer. Placing your order in advance reduces the risk of stock and/or delivery time slots being unavailable; while we try to be responsive to last minute requests any order within seven days of delivery needs to be confirmed with us by phone on 0800 910 1015 prior to placing.

A. Payment needs to be made when placing an order to confirm unless an account is already in place with us. Payment can be made by credit or debit card when going through the checkout procedure. Should you select the “Pay by Bank Transfer" option, we will email you our bank details. Please call us if you have not received this email within 48 hours. We cannot hold goods if you do not pay us, any unpaid orders will be cancelled and the items released back into general stock. We get this occasionally, customers will place an order and choose the pay by bank transfer option. Three months later, two days prior to the event, they’ll call our office and try and make payment for their order. We hate to say no to anyone, but this is where we have to the most.

A. We are a hire company, the equipment we hire is listed on our website and described to the best of our ability. Please make sure you know how to use the equipment before you hire it. If you’re running a concession at a festival please know how to use an LPG fryer. If you hire a fridge and stick it under a gazebo in 30 degree heat please don’t complain if you struggle to keep your cakes cold. As much as we like to help we do not know your event, do not know what you are using this equipment for. We cannot second guess our customers and correct any mistakes they might make in terms of equipment suitability.

A. No, we’re not gas engineers and are unable to connect your gas bottle to your equipment. It’s an amazingly easy process, we event supply the spanner, we just can’t set your equipment up for you.

If you are nervous about doing this or want further information please contact a gas safe engineer for help in setting up your equipment.

A. To request an account with us, please speak to us on 0800 910 1015. Credit accounts are only available to businesses placing orders in excess of £5,000 per annum and who have filed accounts with Companies House in the previous 12 months. New accounts cannot be set up for orders placed within fourteen days of delivery.

A. If you need to change your order, please contact us as soon as possible by phone on 0800 910 1015. We will endeavour to fulfil requests; however please be aware that stock is limited and it may not be possible to do so. Furthermore, as orders are picked three days prior to delivery we absolutely cannot guarantee any changes within that timeframe.

The standard charge for delivery and collection is £20 plus VAT. This single charge covers a single driver drop-off to and collection from the kerbside within 10 driving miles of our base in Henley-on-Thames at any time between 8am and 8pm. Outside of this area, we charge an additional £2 per mile. If you would like to know how much we will charge to deliver to and collect from you, you can check by entering your postcode into the carriage calculator on the home page. Should you need further assistance with timed deliveries or collections, set up or anything else please speak to us when we confirm your order – we must however warn that there will be additional charges payable.

A.The Evolved Hire Group delivers catering equipment, event hire and exhibition furniture throughout the country. A list of all our websites is available below.

https://www.avonhire.com - based in Bristol serving Devon, Cornwall and Somerset

https://www.birminghamcateringhire.com - based in Birmingham serving West Midlands, Warwickshire and Staffordshire

https://www.capitaleventhire.com – based in Kensington serving the London area

https://www.cateringhirescotland.com - based in Glasgow serving Edinburgh, Glasgow and Scotland

https://www.chilternhire.com – based in Milton Keynes, serving Oxfordshire, Northamptonshire, Buckinghamshire and Bedfordshire

https://www.cotswoldhire.com – based in Cheltenham, serving Gloucestershire, Worcestershire and Herefordshire

https://www.eastangliahire.com - based in Norwich serving Norfolk, Suffolk and East Anglia

https://www.midlandhire.co.uk – based at East Midlands Airport serving Leicestershire, Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire

https://www.northwesthire.com – based in Manchester serving Lancashire, Cheshire and Merseyside

http://www.solenthire.com – based in Southampton serving Hampshire, Dorset, West Sussex and the South Coast region

https://www.southwaleshire.com - based in Cardiff serving Glamorgan, Swansea and the South Wales area

https://www.thamesvalleyhire.com - based in Henley-on-Thames serving Berkshire, Surrey and the Thames Valley region.

https://www.whiterosehire.com - based in Leeds serving Leeds, Sheffield and Yorkshire

A. From our experience with catering, event and exhibition hire we cannot recommend strongly enough that you book for items to be delivered at least the day prior to your event. Sometimes things out of our control go awry, and having 24 hours to fix them is preferable to having 24 minutes. We can’t be held responsible for problems with an event if we are delivering on the day of an event.

A. Collection is possible only from our Birmingham warehouse, between the hours of 8am and 4pm, Monday to Saturday. Select collection on the checkout on Birmingham Catering Hire to confirm the dates you would like to collect and return your items. If possible, please contact us prior to arrival so we can be ready for you.

Our standard delivery charge covers a delivery and collection at any time between 8am and 8pm on the dates requested. Our driver will attempt to call the number provided by the customer 30-60 minutes prior to arrival.

A delivery or collection slot can be requested at the time of ordering providing there is at least seven days until delivery. Slots are subject to availability of vehicles and drivers, and requests are dealt with on a first come, first served basis. The minimum cost of a slot is outlined below:

4 hour slot £20

2 hour slot £50

1 hour slot £100

Please note that this cost is for a timed delivery OR collection slot between 8am and 8pm. We strongly recommend delivery at least 24 hours prior to your event.

A. No. If extra assistance for set up is required this must be requested when the order is confirmed; there may be an additional payment for this requirement and full indemnification in case of accidents must be in place. All our drivers are insured to do their job, they’re not insured on flights of stairs though. Please don’t be offended if they gently turn down your request, they just know if they’re off work for 3 months with a broken leg due to an accident on stairs then they won’t get paid.

A. In the majority of cases, the customer will need to be present to sign paperwork for hire equipment received. However, if notified beforehand (and given approval), we can liaise with venues with respect to delivery and collection. One of few exceptions to this is when ordering hire for a stand at an exhibition centre; as we deliver and collect directly from the stand during set-up and breakdown we do not need the customer to be present.

A. Sometimes, things don’t go quite to plan and an issue may occur. The imperative thing to do is to call us as soon as a problem becomes apparent on 0800 910 1015; the sooner we know and the more time we have the more chance an issue can be quickly resolved.

A. No – we don’t charge a damage deposit prior to hiring items out. However, should breakages or losses occur then you may be liable for a replacement fee for the item, which is 10 times the hire price as standard.

A. Items need to be returned to us clean and in a condition to be rehired again immediately.

We appreciate that some people may not fancy the prospect of cleaning up after a huge event and as such offer a “send it back dirty” service whereby crockery and cutlery only needs to be scraped of food waste and liquids emptied from glasses prior to return for us to professionally delivered. The cost of this service is an additional 25% to the hire cost.

We’ve found in our experience that the majority of breakages to crockery and glassware happen during cleaning and as such we recommend that the “send it back dirty” service is utilised to prevent that.

A. In theory, yes, but the practicality is that we strongly recommend using gas equipment at any outdoor event with a temporary power supply. This is because temporary power supplies are not designed for appliances with high power ratings such as turbofan ovens fryer, etc. Using these kinds of appliances on temporary power supplies will cause the supply to trip and the appliance to not work properly or at all.

All electrical items are PAT tested prior to dispatch. If you use electrical items on a temporary power supply against our advice, you do so at your own risk.

Premium delivery ensures that the delivery driver will be accompanied by a second person to ensure efficient delivery of heavy or awkward items. In addition, it will increase the allotted time for your delivery and collection from 15 minutes to 30 minutes.

It is obvious that 2020 has been a horrific year for the hospitality industry. Not only has there been an initial lockdown causing all manner of events to be cancelled, but there are now “local lockdowns” being enforced which has caused further events to be postponed and cancelled.

With this in mind, the first and most important thing we can advise customers is that it is imperative that insurance of some kind is procured for an event. If there is any uncertainty about an event going ahead due to proposed lockdown conditions, that must be taken into consideration when hiring any equipment.

As per our terms and conditions, we cannot refund any order that has been cancelled because of coronavirus. We can reschedule orders (subject to availability) to another date if an event has been postponed, or we can offer a credit note valid until the end of 2021 for use with any other event. We must stress if you are not happy with those conditions then you should not place an order.