Wren kitchen, best time to buy, now or post Xmas sale?
Discussion
NST said:
Of anyone is interested in knowing what wren behaves.. Please DM me.
I can say one thing. You would need to be completely nuts to buy any kitchen from Wren.
The kitchen arrived in bits.. Took them near enough 3 months to have the doors / plinths finishing bits delivered to complete the kitchen to 95%. But there is still bits missing.. Lost will to live.. The Builder made it very clear don't use wren... I really wish I didn't.
The customer services team are pretty clueless, (pushed around from people to people). The 'case management team's are quite frankly rude and incompetent.
The compensation that they offered is wel... pennies considering the 'infinity plus' kitchen we ordered.. Customer satisfaction and customer care is not some Wren understand.
When things go wrong wren are not able sort things out.. I'm glad I took pictures throu the whole process and kept all the emails..
You have been warned!
Couldn't agree more - we've been in dispute with them for nearly 6 years...still not sorted. Have you been on any of the Wren Facebook groups?I can say one thing. You would need to be completely nuts to buy any kitchen from Wren.
The kitchen arrived in bits.. Took them near enough 3 months to have the doors / plinths finishing bits delivered to complete the kitchen to 95%. But there is still bits missing.. Lost will to live.. The Builder made it very clear don't use wren... I really wish I didn't.
The customer services team are pretty clueless, (pushed around from people to people). The 'case management team's are quite frankly rude and incompetent.
The compensation that they offered is wel... pennies considering the 'infinity plus' kitchen we ordered.. Customer satisfaction and customer care is not some Wren understand.
When things go wrong wren are not able sort things out.. I'm glad I took pictures throu the whole process and kept all the emails..
You have been warned!
FWIW said:
A brief summary of experience with Wren:
We ordered in Feb 2014 with an agreement that they would fit the following half term a few weeks later. They did the best design and had the best price, plus 12mths 0%. It was a no brainier.
Then it started to go wrong; communication was very poor and they kept delaying the installation date.
When installation finally started a couple of months later than agreed their fitter noticed that quite a few frontals were missing although the ones we did have looked good. The wrong worktops were delivered twice. The fitter carried on and ordered the missing parts. Some weeks later he returned to the new bits but they didn’t match the originals and the finish was poor.
Wren told us that they had brought production in house and were having issues with the paint machine, but that they would replace all the frontals. This took months. Communication was woeful.
A full set of frontals had been delivered to the showroom but nobody told me or the fitter and they ended up getting disposed of some months later.
The MD, Armando Sanchez came out to see me and said all the right things. He assured me that they would sort it. I said I was worried about the quality and durability of the paint finish. Armando was adamant that they had resolved the issues and would send me a sample to prove it. A couple of weeks later, a very well packed sample arrived. Chipped.
They started pressuring me to sign the completion certificate and said that if I didn’t they would exercise their right to cancel my finance agreement. I said I would do so when they completed the kitchen.
They then said that they would arrange another set of frontals. I agreed but asked them not to deliver until we had a fitter and fitting date lined up as I had nowhere to store them for any length of time. A few weeks later a Wren van turned up at 6.45am. I should have rejected the delivery but was half asleep! We didn’t have a fitting date. I stored the parts in the loft of my garage.
They then cancelled my finance agreement and took me to court for non payment.
We settled out of court on the agreement that I would pay when they completed the kitchen.
There was some to and fro about what works needed to be completed and they sent an installation manager to check everything. He wouldn’t move the stock from my garage due to elf n safety and they said that they were worried about damage due to the storage in my garage and that I would have to pay for any damages. I told them, no chance. It was their stock and their responsibility. They were very aggressive but finally backed down.
Installation manager came out again with the fitter and they checked through the parts. It looked like they rejected about half of them due to the paint finish. There was no storage damage.
A few weeks later the missing parts arrived and were fitted. There were many frontals with poor finish, chips etc. The fitter tried to cover the chips with a waxy touch up pen but it just wiped off.
Months later another fitter came to finish off but needed to order parts. He took away the freezer frontal for paint matching. That must be 18 months ago.
12 months ago I made Section 75 claim with AMEX as I’d paid a deposit on my card. 8 months later they rejected my claim saying I was attempting double recovery and hadn’t mitigated my losses. Made no sense to me! Then I discovered via Amex that Wren had emailed me to an old email address (hadn’t been used for 4 years) saying that they had written off the debt c.£9k and that I had no warranty and there would be activity on my account. Wren also told Amex that I had refused them access to carry out remedial work.
So, after 6 years I’m now left with a s
tty, faulty, part finished kitchen which I have paid about £4K for.
They are liars, bullies, and their product is crap and their customer service is worse.
Just my opinion, obvs.
Completely agree on the above. The owner and CEO clearly not customer oriented people.. We ordered in Feb 2014 with an agreement that they would fit the following half term a few weeks later. They did the best design and had the best price, plus 12mths 0%. It was a no brainier.
Then it started to go wrong; communication was very poor and they kept delaying the installation date.
When installation finally started a couple of months later than agreed their fitter noticed that quite a few frontals were missing although the ones we did have looked good. The wrong worktops were delivered twice. The fitter carried on and ordered the missing parts. Some weeks later he returned to the new bits but they didn’t match the originals and the finish was poor.
Wren told us that they had brought production in house and were having issues with the paint machine, but that they would replace all the frontals. This took months. Communication was woeful.
A full set of frontals had been delivered to the showroom but nobody told me or the fitter and they ended up getting disposed of some months later.
The MD, Armando Sanchez came out to see me and said all the right things. He assured me that they would sort it. I said I was worried about the quality and durability of the paint finish. Armando was adamant that they had resolved the issues and would send me a sample to prove it. A couple of weeks later, a very well packed sample arrived. Chipped.
They started pressuring me to sign the completion certificate and said that if I didn’t they would exercise their right to cancel my finance agreement. I said I would do so when they completed the kitchen.
They then said that they would arrange another set of frontals. I agreed but asked them not to deliver until we had a fitter and fitting date lined up as I had nowhere to store them for any length of time. A few weeks later a Wren van turned up at 6.45am. I should have rejected the delivery but was half asleep! We didn’t have a fitting date. I stored the parts in the loft of my garage.
They then cancelled my finance agreement and took me to court for non payment.
We settled out of court on the agreement that I would pay when they completed the kitchen.
There was some to and fro about what works needed to be completed and they sent an installation manager to check everything. He wouldn’t move the stock from my garage due to elf n safety and they said that they were worried about damage due to the storage in my garage and that I would have to pay for any damages. I told them, no chance. It was their stock and their responsibility. They were very aggressive but finally backed down.
Installation manager came out again with the fitter and they checked through the parts. It looked like they rejected about half of them due to the paint finish. There was no storage damage.
A few weeks later the missing parts arrived and were fitted. There were many frontals with poor finish, chips etc. The fitter tried to cover the chips with a waxy touch up pen but it just wiped off.
Months later another fitter came to finish off but needed to order parts. He took away the freezer frontal for paint matching. That must be 18 months ago.
12 months ago I made Section 75 claim with AMEX as I’d paid a deposit on my card. 8 months later they rejected my claim saying I was attempting double recovery and hadn’t mitigated my losses. Made no sense to me! Then I discovered via Amex that Wren had emailed me to an old email address (hadn’t been used for 4 years) saying that they had written off the debt c.£9k and that I had no warranty and there would be activity on my account. Wren also told Amex that I had refused them access to carry out remedial work.
So, after 6 years I’m now left with a s
tty, faulty, part finished kitchen which I have paid about £4K for. They are liars, bullies, and their product is crap and their customer service is worse.
Just my opinion, obvs.
Edited by FWIW on Friday 20th December 13:49
NST said:
Completely agree on the above. The owner and CEO clearly not customer oriented people..
You can say that again! What they are good at, is manipulating social media. Anything negative on their Facebook page gets deleted and the poster blocked - and they are VERY efficient at doing this. Also, they report negative Trustpilot reviews which then get suspended/deleted and it takes a concerted effort from the reviewer to get the review reinstated (rarely), by which time its dropped well down the page.Gassing Station | Homes, Gardens and DIY | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff