Had a quote from zenith windows - is this reasonable? Has anyone used this company?

[ProfYaffle]

We are having 4 windows replaced. 3 are v large and the old sash boxes are to be removed (makes it a bigger job apparently) the 4th a small window and a straightforward remove/replace.

The quote was for £3.5k. We have previously been quoted £2.5k but this option left the sash boxes in place which we're told is an inferior job. It was also from Anglian Windows and we heard some very poor reports about their workmanship.

Has anyone used Zenith Staybright? What were they like?

TIA

Not sued them, but Staybright (I presume the same company) quoted us £1,500ish to replace our backdoor and we got it done by a local company for £900.

Used them that is.

No personal experience but there are sme reviews here

lol at not sued them..that is about right tho imo

They really gave us the hard sell in our dining room, "Sign up tonight and we can halve the cost". Poor bloke didn't realised that anyone who says that to us automatically gets turfed out on their ear!

Thanks for that link. Glad you didn't sue them LilBlood!

Hmmm, am thinking they are expensive now. Not sure, not sure.....

We were very pleased with the conservatory zenith built for us 2 years ago. The product was excellent but they are more expensive. Before we went ahead we told them we liked the product but that they were much more expensive than other quotes we had had. We kept this up for some while (they kept ringing us) until they agreed to take the price down to an amount we were prepared to pay.

I worked for Zenith one summer when I was at university doing telesales (yes I was the annoying person phoning you up saying would you like 'free' windows ).

Bunch of cowboys tbh.

However all double glazing firms are probably equally cowboyish. You must do what nickToD did, keep holding out while the price comes down.

had terrible time with them. HUGE quote and seller sitting in livingroom and refusing to leave till papers signed

We brought doors from crystal windows and got local builder to fit, cost less

HTH

That's interesting Nick. We signed up on the night but have changed our minds now (7 day cooling off period to cancel) but they're sending someone round to make us cancel in person rather than by letter We were wondering if it's worth trying to get the price down again.

it's so bloody hard, we've heard bad things about Zenith and Anglian, how on earth do you decide which company is reputable? There are a couple of small local companies I'm tempted to investigate but again, how do you know about the quality of product, will they be around in 10 years to honour any guarantees etc?

I used to work for zenith in a 'customer services' role. Would never use them. We were shown A window unit that cost £45 to mkaae and a rep was laughing about how he could easily charge £400 for that window and what he charged depended entirely on how much HE wanted in his bank at end of month!!!

If they are making you cancel in person it is to intimidate you into staying with them.

I would have a phrase that explains you are cancelling, and in the end just keep saying it over and over again no matter what they say back to you.

Also try to use the sales guys name, eg "Bob, I am cancelling my contract, I do not want your windows" whatever he responds to try to persuade you, you just repeat "Bob, I am cancelling my contract, I do not want your windows"

I would not try to get the price down, a smaller local company would be a better option. Any sales company who does pressurised sales is not a good company to do business with.

As the windows are now of a much higher quality I don't see the need to worry about the 10 year guarentee. Any company offering that length of guarentee is not worried about anything happening in that 10 years.

We had zenith round and they quoted an extortionate amount (3k for 4 big windows 3 little ones) and did the whole calling the office to try to get us a better deal etc etc. And we could NOT get them to go.

We had Anglian round, and said, look if you can do all our windows for 1.5k we will use you. And, surprisingly enough, they did. And the workmanship is fine.

The company also needs to be FENSA certified. Are they?

Well the salesman arrived, dh and I very stern, said we had 10 mins before we were going out, just wanted to sign the papers etc. Salesman did whole ringing his boss pantomime (v amusing btw) then said to us "If we say £2k can we go ahead?" dh and I really but decided to go ahead. Whole thing done and dusted in under half an hour.

Most of the stuff I've seen about Zenith seems to say awful sales technicue but the actual product and workmanship are good so we're quite happy.

Oh and they are fensa registered, he banged on about it length!

that sounds like a result!

i know england is dear, but i had a full house (10 windows) replaced about three years ago for £2,000.

that included taking out sashes and a pre-made arch for one of the windows.

sounds extortionate to me.

We had a quote from Zenith that was supposedly a "special promotional offer" but it still seemed extotionate. We got a local company in and their quote was less than half that of Zenith, so we went with them and their windows were fine.