Moben Kitchens - Are they any good??

Jo_anne_2

We have a Moben kitchen and after my initial misgivings about the company and their sales techniques, I have been very pleased with it. The fitter was very good and thorough and the kitchen itself has stood up to around 7 years of family life and is still looking fine. It cost us about £6k which I thought wasn't bad at the time. Maybe I was just lucky!

rayaans

Just had a kitchen design done by moben kitchens. I dont know about the designers all you guys have had but ours knew everything. Maybe that has something do with him being an italian kitchen and shoe designer but he was very polite. It was a little tricky with the accent he had but the design was amazing. Far better than the designs done by B&Q, Ikea and Kutchenhaus. The price was cheaper too so im very happy with their service.

ormus

Oopsey

ormus wrote: »

:eek:

keep taking the methadone, mate.

I suppose that they are OK if you don't mind them taking 7 months, still not finished and all the wall units fell off the wall smashing everything....

stuartl

I have worked for their parent company as a fitter and in Management. All I can say is AVOID THEM AT ALL COSTS and I will outline why.

They frequently go into administration and that renders any warranties worthless.
They demand FULL payment before the fitting starts.
Once they have your money they couldnt care less if you have a problem.
Products are VERY low quality. (I have been fitting kitchens and bathrooms for over 20 years so know what I am talking about)
Fitters are ALL (YES ALL) subcontract. They have NO direct employed fitters.
The only time they listen is when you threaten Watchdog or other media.
Surveyors and salesmen make promises they know wont be upheld then leave the !!!! for everyone else to pick up.
If they told me the time of day I would check my watch as they are only familiar with lies to get you off the phone.

Take it from me as an ex employee and Manager, they trade off the back of glossy brochures and tv ads but are massively in debt and lose money each year and staff turnover is unbelievable. The Managers, (ha ha what a joke) in charge now are only there as they are unemployable elsewhere and will probably be genuinely surprised when the Official Receivers take control and their company cars are trailered away early one morning very soon without any warning. Remember where and when you heard this, it is gonna happen VERY SOON!!!!

IF you want to be conned CHOOSE MOBEN!!!!

Adam_Ant

The only way you will get any form of satisfaction with Moben & their associate companies is to take them to County Court. They soon pay attention then! Basically, don't deal with them in the first place.

martinb57

I was a kitchen installer for 25 years and over that time I have fitted just about every type of kitchen from the cheap and cheerful to the downright awful and the best that money can buy. My son worked for me for ten years and has carried on the installation business and was recently asked by a friend who contracts to Moben if he could help him out by fittting a kitchen for him to which he agreed.

As my son's assistant as on holiday at the time he asked me if I could give him a hand for a couple of days (unpaid of course, when does a son ever pay his dad?) So having given you some background on our experience these are our thoughts on Moben.

The quality of the units was not bad, they are flat packed which surprised us given the cost, but they were 18mm colour matched cabinets and even the back was 18mm and when built were good and rigid and square (not always the case with some kitchen cabinets)

The surveyor that carried out the final measurements obviously had a rubber tape measure as the planned kitchen simply did not fit and the only way that it could be made to fit was to leave out a unit and make up a custom sized wine rack, luckily there were sufficient materials on site to do this. He also missed some blindingly obvious plumbing requirements which added about 4 hours work to sort out.

As this was a fairly large kitchen (34 cabinets + appliances) it was difficult to check that all of the components were on site as everything was piled up in the garage, and as we got to around the halfway point in the job we realised that there were a number of items missing, these were promised for delivery in a couple of days, they eventually arrived 7 weeks later, we didn't go back but my son's friend had to in oreder that he could get paid the 20% balance of the fitting charge (Why the fitter should be made to wait when it was clearly the company's error I have no idea)

Being a nosey beggar I asked the customer how much she had paid for the kitchen and I was staggered when she told me that it was £16,000, but that was after she and her husband had "knocked the salesman down from £19,000" Out of curiosity I gave the plan to the manager at our local Howdens where we have an account and asked him to give me a quote without appliances, I then added some profit on, priced for Neff or Bosch aplliances (Moben's are own branded and average quality) and added what would be my son's fitting charge (more on this later) and the total came to just under £10,000 so price wise I would say that Moben are way too expensive.

With regard to sub-contract fitters, this is the way that most kitchen companies work, and whilst there are definitely some cowboys out there ther are also a lot (like I was and my son is) who take a great deal of pride in their work. When we left this Moben fit (missing items aside) the customer was delighted with what we had done and I would have been proud to show anyone the standard of finish & workmanship. Then came the bombshell for my son, his friend asked him to send an invoice for the fit and it was roughly half of what we would consider a reasonable charge for fitting this kitchen. My son's friend confirmed that this was what Moben were paying him and showed us the paperwork as evidence. All I can say is that my son will not be fitting another Moben kitchen, and it doesn't surprise me that some of their fitters are not that good and as someone mentioned "left the rubbish under the units" Fitting a kitchen to a high standard is a multi-skilled occupation, and not something that just anyone can do, and as such any decent fitter is worth paying well. None of us get rich but we do expect to get paid for our talents, but Moben seem to value their (high pressure) salesmen much more highly

Anyway, I have made this long enough and I hope that it is useful to anyone reading. My advice, shop around, get several quotes, particularly from independent local businesses, ask for references, most of my work came from recommendation, and my son get's most of his work the same way. As for Moben, all I would say is "Buyer Beware"

phill99

Why are you adding to a post that was started 2 years ago? What are you on !!!!!!?

meekrick

3 hours for £12k is quite cheap.

Alias_Omega

Passing through Homebase one day, Mrs AO has a look for ideas for a new kitchen. The sales rep gets a grip of Mrs AO and soon we know they are round the house. The kitchen company was Moben.

Kitchen designed, planned and sorted. The price was £8.000 for the whole lot, final offer..

Complete madness, had it supplied and fitted locally for just over £900 in all..

/Avoid..