Poor Customer Service

I've never felt the need to write a review for a service I've received before; however, following the appalling after sales care I received from Pure Kitchens I feel compelled to let others in the St.Albans and wider Herts area know so they can make an informed decision when deciding on whether to to use this company. We had our kitchen fitted about two years and paid a lot of money for a high quality and spec kitchen, along with the more personal service that Pure Kitchens seemed to offer. After a number of issues with the builders they recommended the kitchen was fitted and we were generally happy and were subsequently told that "if we ever had any problems at any time in the future don't hesitate to let them know and they would get it resolved". About two months ago the fitted doors of the washing machine and dish-washer fell off in the space of 24hrs, and it's here that this sorry episode begins. My wife called the St.Albans shop and explained the problem and was impressed that someone would be around the following day to have a look - she was told the fitters job for the day finished between 3 and 4 pm, and would then call after that. On Fri morning (approx 11:30am) my wife noticed that she had a missed call (no message was left), so she called the number at about 12:30 (having been mid-way through giving our young children lunch). The number was the fitter and he wanted to know what the problem was so she explained, but he then said it was "too late as he was no longer in the area" - this seemed very strange as he then asked her where she lived! The fitter then proceeded to say that it was my wife's fault for not picking up the phone and not being there, even though the shop had said it would be sometime after 15:30. Finally, he said he wouldn't be in the area until 24 Sep so would have to wait until then. My wife then tried to call the shop all afternoon, but there was no reply (a seemingly regular occurence). On the following Mon she then spoke to someone at the shop who said that "we didn't employ fitters to have good customer service". Needless to say we were somewhat taken aback by this statement! There was then a further delay so I looked to get the replacement parts online and sent some photos of the problem to a number of main stockists of the kitchen range that Pure Kitchens fitted for us. It was then that we really began to worry about the workmanship and fitting as one of them came back to me stating, "Just out of curiosity in the image below, has the side of the door been trimmed to allow the door to open??" (Note: it had been 'trimmed' by the Pure Kitchens installer) "If this is the case they have installed in incorrectly which is probably why you have the issue of the hinge plates braking. It looks like the hinge hole has been drilled in the wrong place on the door so they have notched a section out of the door to allow it to open. This is wrong. The easy fit hinge should simply fit to the door, in a hinge hole, and then to the plate which is fitted to the carcase without any notching out of the door. I would hazard a guess this is why you have the problem as it has over stressed the hinge plate on opening so it has eventually broken." There was then a further delay of several days of mails not being responded to and various excuses, until we were given another day and a time of "broadly 11am, but the fitter will call in the morning to confirm". At about 12:45 no one had arrived or called and my wife was forced to take our son to hospital having fallen. Just as she was leaving there was a call from the fitter and she explained what the situation was and the 'fitter' then said "well we won't be coming again" and put the phone down on her! Since then I've had to pay for another kitchen fitter to come around to fix these problems and unfortunately he called me to say they are "unravelling a bit of a disastrous attempt at kitchen fitting to say the least" - shortcuts taken everywhere, pieces of cardboard used, appliances not screwed in properly etc etc. Needless to say I've not had any responses to e-mails or telephone messages. My key issue was around the appalling customer service and downright rudeness/aggressiveness in a number of areas, but my greater concern is now the quality of the kitchen and what will go wrong in the future. I would thoroughly recommend that anyone considering using this company give them very careful consideration based on the quality of work and after sales care that customers can receive.

simon miles - 28/11/2012 | report this review