Double glazing company won't talk to wife unless husband is present?

[PrettyPickle]

Just been at my friends house and there was a knock at the door. It was a young lad canvassing for work for a double glazing firm. My mate is interested in having a couple of windows replaced and would be interested in a quote. The young lad asked when her husband would be home and she explained he worked away from home and she dealt with all stuff like this.

He explained that the husband had to be present. She asked why as the house is in her name only and has no mortgage and she would be paying for the windows in cash (not finance) from her money, not her husbands. She explained it was her 2nd marriage and he rented his home out. Well my mind was boggling about why she should have to share this info.

The young lad said he understood but his guidance was that the husband had to be present to allow it to progress. She asked why her husband, why not the three adult kids who also lived in the home and actually had a bigger stake in it as its their inheritance. He seemed perplexed but said that is how it works. My mate thanked him and said that she understood he had to follow the rules so thanks but no thanks.

Apparently this has happened before and whilst she would discuss it with her husband as part of their daily life, she didn't need him to be present, it was her decision, not his.

10 minutes later he returned saying he had explained to the office and they said it would be OK as it was all her property, so they agreed to ring at 4pm. My friend said if they brought up the subject of her husband needing to be present she would not be happy.

4pm came, someone rang and they said her husband had to be present. She explained the earlier conversation and that her husband had no say in the house (they have this legally tied up as they both have kids from a previous marriage) but he was adamant that they could not attend without her husband being present.

Now we both would get this to a certain extent if he was an owner of the property or was contributing to the home improvements but he is not.

Vote:

YANBU for refusing to have her husband present
YABU for her not understanding her husband needed to be present

What is it, the 1950s?? I changed windows and the front door in two separate transactions with two different companies and at no point my husband was involved, I dealt with the company all the way. His name is on the mortgage too. You sign a contract and pay upfront before any work is carried out so I don’t understand what’s the issue? If someone told me I can’t order a window without my husband’s permission I would make a snarky comment and find another company

I ended up at a back-lane traditional joiners run by two old guys. They were quite happy to deal with me directly for my windows at about 1/4 of the price quoted by Anglian

Wouldn't give the dinosaurs my business ..Strong independent women run and pay for houses without the need for a man's input or consent.
I love my singledom.

It’s also possible they want a 3rd party to be there so no false allegations can be made against their sales staff.

we are in the construction industry and DH made appointments to visit properties and twice now when he has turned up, the person at home is wearing very little and inappropriate attire. He won’t enter the house and re-schedules with the property manager (both were tenanted homes) or lets them know he won’t go back.

2 of our industry colleagues have had female clients serve trespass orders when final payment for work was due, both stating the workmanship was unprofessional, so the orders prevent them from going back and ‘rectifying’ the situation as our law allows or taking photos for evidence.

these are of course rare examples but might offer some reasoning to the situation.

Happened to me. Promptly escorted him out the door. Absolute nonsense!

Regardless of the ins and outs of husbands being present, NO WAY would I have used that firm!

It’s because they want you to sign up there and then when the agent comes.

my parents had it happen 25+ years ago, they wanted double glazing - the salesman came and my dad wanted the windows but refused to sign there and then - he was a solicitor and wouldn’t be bullied - he had to threaten to call the police to get the guy to leave

then got another firm to do the windows a month later - bizarre sales technique

Report the company to Trading Standards. This is sex discrimination !

This happened to me with someone doorstepping for solar panels. Wouldn’t give me any info because my husband wasn’t home.

They do. This is a long-established sales routine - they've been doing it for decades. I'm just surprised that so many on this thread are surprised by it. It's usually the big national companies that do it. Their thinking is that if both members of a couple are there, they can't get out of signing up by saying they need to wait and discuss it with their partner/husband/wife first.

Their other tactics include refusing to give you a price breakdown, starting with a very high price, then giving you a fantastic special offer - but only if you sign up right now. They also come and sit in your house for hours - you have to be extremely direct/actually rude to get rid of them.

^Totally this.

I wouldn’t even entertain all this pissing around about it.

It's really not.

No point wasting time. I bet they'll say the have the same policy for men, the wife must be there. This is nothing to do with sex, everything to do with high pressure sales

They do have the same policy for men. A quick google gives you posts on other websites from men wondering why double glazing salesmen won't talk to them unless their wife is there too.

It is not sex discrimination. It's quite simply a sales technique. And it must work on enough people to make it worth their while because they have been doing it for decades.

This happened to me. I told them to do one! My DH isn’t even on the mortgage.

When we were getting our double glazing sorted out we both had to be there for the sales bit because that way nobody could say they didn’t agree to the work after it had been carried out and therefore refuse to pay. It feels a bit antiquated, especially when in this case it was so obviously unnecessary, but it does seem to be standard policy and I can see why they do it.

This is a sales tactic so she can't back out at the end with I need to speak to my husband. It's mysoginistic shit but clearly they have employed people who can't tell they have the decision maker in front of them

Exactly what I would do, and have done in past with double glazing and kitchen companies. We just got quotes for bathrooms. All were happy to deal with me. I wanted DH there only because , I wanted his opinion on the layout etc, as we both live here, but that's all.

Fuck are they STILL doing this?

When I was being quoted for new windows in 1993, a couple of salesman tried this one on me and I told them if they didn't want to quote me for windows for an entire large house to piss off out of my house and I would find someone who did.

Everyone quoted.

Exactly this. I went on a sales course like this to sell fitted kitchens. Horrendous. Basically never buy ANYTHING from reps who come to your house in the evening, much better going to a shop.

They sound like high pressure type salespeople and I would not use them.

I've had this too. We played along, let them survey and then they came on an evening to give us the prices. I went upstairs to bath the baby. Every time they tried to discuss money with my husband, he said he was unable to speak until his wife was present. After quite a long time he allowed them to give him the quote and then said he had to ask me as I was paying (I wasn't but that's not the point). When I joined I told them no and refused the price. They reduced the quote to a quarter of the original.price by the end. Double glazing companies are sharks. Treat them accordingly.

I had this with a door company that is well renowned for their locks. As it happens, they were very pushy with the sales patter and we didn’t progress.

My guess is so they try to persuade the man and overrule the woman. It didn’t work in our case!

We got a quote from Safestyle for our windows and it was the same, DH had to be there. I'm actually glad he was as we had to threaten the salesman with the Police after 2 hours of hard sell that we weren't giving in to. It was horrendous, and the price was daylight robbery from £16k to £10k with a phone call from the Manager the worst sales tactics I've ever seen in my life. We had them done for under £6k with a local trader.

We had to go to Trading Standards in the end to stop the harrassment by phone. Please don't ever invite these people into your home without backup of another adult.

You're half right.

It's also a sales tactic so he can't back out at the end with "I need to speak to my wife".