Hi Ian,
I love reading your threads. Very interesting. Help me out here and please tell me that all of these rumours I keep hearing about heavy snow in a few weeks are wrong.

I'm being a tad selfish here. It really is bad for business.

Last years cost me a few grand.
Frost I like. Car batteries die. A bit of snow isn't bad. But snow like last year is bad. Customers can't get their cars into me...

I think it's ok to be selfish every now and then.

Cheer me up please mate.
Kev.
Hi Kev! Hehe, if I had a £1 for every time that snowy October forecast has been mentioned, I'd be rich beyond my wildest imagination.

It's where the Daily Express and Daily Mail had picked up on just the odd off chance comment based on a rouge computer output, and next thing we know, it's Snowmaggedon-type-front page headlines!
October snowfalls over England are extremely rare, except perhaps over the highest ground (the Pennines, Cotswolds, etc). Usually the first significant snowfalls in October occurs over the Scottish hills and mountains but even that is uncommon.
However, in October frost does become a regular thing as it continue to grow darker for longer with each passing day.
I'm not really a big fan of long range forecasts as we'd be entering crystal ball type guessimate territory, but I will provide an answer to what this autumn will be like anyway. It's all based on average trends, what the computer outputs has been saying lately, that kind of thing.
I'd say that the end of September (as you already are aware) and the first half of October will be dry, warm and quite bright (the makings of an indian summer), especially to the south of the UK.
But then a pattern change will take place in the middle part of October thus leading to unsettled conditions as we wear on into the second half of October and into November as the Atlantic wakes up. That'll keep things mild and wet, and may even become stormy at times.
By Decemeber, THEN thing willl start to turn colder with snow becoming a regular occurance as a Northern Blocking pattern sets in (pressure being high to the north of the UK thus forcing winds to come in from the east). But I don't think it'll be as harsh as what we had last year.
Like I said, all this should be taken with a large pinch of salt but that's my take on things.