On the first day of Christmas...

Ah Christmas. That magical time of year when you stay up all night writing cards to people you haven't phoned all year; when weekends are spent up a ladder desperately hunting for those broken fairy lights, and you bankrupt yourself on lastminute and ultimately unwanted presents.

No wonder a survey put Christmas up there with divorce, moving house and changing jobs as the sixth most stressful life event (except, of course, that you're supposed to enjoy it). But, oh joy, a company called Delegate Life has come to the rescue.

For £495 (steep, I know, but remember all those costly mistakes), they will buy and send all your cards, purchase all your gifts and wrap them beautifully, clean your house (including the oven) trim your tree and hang a wreath - in fact, do practically everything except cook the wretched turkey.

"Bah, humbug!" was my husband's response. "I want to decorate our own tree!" Given that last year our tree had stood, naked, until 23 December, when I decorated it alone into the wee small hours, I didn't care.

This year, Christmas would be sorted in a day. And thus it was that I found myself sipping champagne and eating mince pies while around me a small army was turning my house into Santa's grotto.

Two professional florists were installing a seven-foot spruce in the sitting room. Instead of my motley ornaments and purple chilli-pepper fairy lights, it was being hung with a tasteful array of oversized baubles in coordinating crimsons.

Meanwhile, an efficient handyman was replacing knobs on a chest of drawers, putting up a curtain rail and hanging pictures in the guest bedroom ready for my mother-in-law's arrival.

Three Eastern European cleaners were toiling over the paper swamp that I laughingly refer to as my study and, best of all, in the kitchen, a friendly chap from Brighter Ovens was buffing my grime-encrusted Smeg with biodegradable products until it shone with an unearthly gleam.

Conducting this troupe of industrious elves was the director of Delegate Life. David Chambers, 27, launched the company 18 months ago, after organising a friend's stag night. Now his Portobello Road-based concierges do anything from finding lost rabbits to sourcing tepees to sleep 75 (they won't, however, supply call-girls, though they have been asked).

As well as the Christmas package, there's a spring-cleaning one starting at £100, including such esoteric services as cleaning the washing machine filter, and a 10-month baby package for £185 a month, offering a nutritionist, a handyman for nursery creation, a baby photographer, a personal shopper, a visit from a babyproofing service and an astrology profile for your little darling.

The ¸ber- efficient David explained all this while simultaneously writing my Christmas cards. This was the service I'd felt most uneasy about using. What if the cards were twee or rude? What if there were spelling mistakes?

In panic, I had reduced the list of recipients to a mixed bag of business contacts and people who would see the funny side if I had to explain myself. Now, looking at the growing pile of tasteful charity cards, beautifully inscribed in ink, I realised with shame that it would be my nearest and dearest who would be receiving the disappointing missives in Biro, probably some time in February.

Of course, Delegate can't eliminate all the effort. If you want them to suggest absolutely perfect presents, you have to provide them with snappy character sketches of the person you're buying for. What, I wondered, would they make of a " seventysomething sculptor, deaf, likes cats, Morecambe and Wise", for instance? The sculptor, a family friend, is getting a Cycladic bronze head.

Other suggestions, which came via email, complete with photographs, were at times inspired, but weren't all brilliant. I couldn't see what use my father-in-law would have for a leather-bound AZ of London as he lives in Derby; and I can't ever imagine my mother using a "dressing book" to note down all her outfits and make sure none of her friends ever saw her wearing the same thing twice.

But a further suggestion, to make her a Friend of the Royal Opera House, was the perfect present - annoyingly, so perfect that she'd actually already bought it for herself the previous week.

My best friend's baby is getting a lovely wooden Noah's Ark, my granny a pair of cashmere socks, my husband a historical atlas of Central Europe - though not, sadly, the costly tickets to Manchester United's game against Tottenham next year - and my impossible-to-buy-for sister-in-law a little holly tree and a jar of gourmet figs, gift-wrapped and dispatched.

My father, whose present is always a last-minute panic buy as he is totally uninterested in wine, food, any kind of sport or clothes, is getting a rather snappy pair of roll-up chairs to take to outdoor opera, elegantly wrapped.

Several hours later, the elves had gone, leaving my house worthy enough to grace the cover of Good Housekeeping. Under the laden tree, a pile of beribboned presents lay in red-and-gold splendour.

The spare room was tidy enough even for my mother-in-law's exacting standards, the air heavy with the scent of spruce, and fairy lights twinkled off the now gleaming surfaces of my oven. I hadn't felt so festive in years. Note to family: forget the presents, this is what I want for Christmas every year.

The £495 Christmas Concierge package includes:

Delegate Life, 0870 225 0445 or www.delegatelife.com