Zenith Commercial?

27col

With all these big companies the secret is to say to them. "You have one chance, and one chance only, to give me a price" This tends to concentrate the mind. I would never buy from any company that says it will give a big discount when pushed about the price. If they can bring the price down when pushed then the original price is not their best price, and as far as I'm concerned the only price I want to hear about is their best price.

stixmcvix

Had a Zenith salesman round last night after receiving three quotes from local companies. Absolutely shocking sales tactics and prices.

REASONS I WILL NOT EVER BUY ANYTHING FROM ZENITH WINDOWS:
1. I made the appointment over the phone with their customer service team. They asked for a secondary contact number just in case they couldn't get through. I reluctantly then gave my husband's number but asked them not to call him as he is very busy at work. They rang him at lunch without trying me first to ask if he'd be there as well tonight when the salesman calls as its company policy to have both husband and wife together if male salesman calls. Shame they didn't ask me if I was alright with that, because I don't have a problem with it! Great example of policy not fitting all customer requirements. Anyway, my husband was furious as he couldn't get them off the phone for 15 minutes.
2. Salesman was 20 minutes late. We'd asked for a 7pm appointment, they pushed it back to 7.30pm and then he finally arrived at 7.50pm on OUR FRIDAY NIGHT.
3. He didn't leave until 10.20pm
4. The sales patter was exhausting and littered with lies/misleading information. Here's a few nuggets: "I worked out recently that the saving you'll make in your bills per year between and A and B rated window, is 40p", he then leafed through his sales literature, and the 40p figure was written down there. So he hadn't worked it out himself! He claimed to have owned his own double glazing company and sold it for a fortune. Why is he now working as some poxy salesman then?!?!?! He said that he'd sneakily asked Everest to come round a few years back to give him a quote. They bought a window sample with them, and he asked to keep it(!!!!!!) which apparently the salesman agreed to (yeah right!!!), he then compared that with the Zenith window sample. Isn't it funny that the bag he bought the Zenith sample out of was big enough for the two samples?? They claim to be the only company in the UK, to have the ACPO Secured by Design mark. This is not true, one other salesman who came to call also has the mark. A quick check on https://www.securedbydesign.com will confirm that hundreds have the mark.
5. Seemed to not really know what he was talking about: he explained that the window would be flushed with the brickwork, so we'd now have internal windowsills which is great. I then asked if they take away the existing sill. He said no, we'll just keep what you've got, but when I pointed out that the existing sill would be too shallow, he said, oh yeah you're right, sorry long day!!!
6. He made us watch a DVD, which was supposed to be "brilliant, and only 3 minutes". It was dull dull dull and lasted 10 minutes.
7. Gave information alluding to the quality of the window which actually don't make any difference at all, and are intended to blind you to the fact that their windows are perhaps only a bit better than others, and not absolutely amazing. E.g. "conventional double glazing has an aluminium spacer. Feel that with you finger. Its cold isn't it? No would you want that in your double glazing making your windows colder?" - well if we're comparing B rated windows with B rated windows, surely the heat transferrance is the same?!?!?!
8. The website shows limited offer 50% off. On closer inspection this is due to the subsidies and Showhome offer. DO NOT BE FOOLED BY THIS, THIS IS THE BIGGEST CON IN THE WORLD!!! The showhome offer is about you being willing to go in their internal magazine and have a board outside for 4 weeks. I was thinking to myself that £2500 off the windows just for having a board outside and going in a magazine that no-one's going to read seems too good to be true! And the magazine isn't really a magazine, its just some pictures of someone's installation. Then the penny dropped. There is no guarantee that you'll end up getting the £2500 money off. In fact they give you two quotes, one thats valid for 2 years at full price, and one thats only valid today with the Showhome discount. But of course, there's no guarantee you'll get the discount, so you could end up paying the full price only. Plus I noticed in the small print, that it said signing up to the showhome scheme means you will DEFINITELY have the board outside, but won't necessarily end up in the magazine. So the worst of both worlds in my eyes. He tried everything to convince us we'd definitely get in, including showing us "memos" that are requesting submissions from our area, saying that he's a Showhome director so he gets first dibs, saying that because its a full installation, it would definitely get priority. PLUS, and this is very important in their sales tactic, the Showhome questionnaire asks you what you do for a living (they say they're trying to find out if you work in a big office to see how much word-of-mouth interest you could generate) but actually its for them to leverage that to pitch how much we can afford. They ask you why you're getting the windows down (security, heat loss, etc.) and then that's sure enough what they'll play to in the sales patter. So we chose heat loss, and obviously a lot of the patter was that no other company go guarantee keeping in the heat, like Zenith.
8. The price. Jesus, I almost died laughing. Our quotes for like-for-like, have been £2300 (cowboy), £3300 (cowboy), £4000 (think we're going to opt for this one) and, wait for it, £19,800!!!!!!!!!!! Incredible. Attempted to compare it to John Lewis v Primark!!! If only they had John Lewis's customer service! Then said "if you want to pay for secure, condensation-proof, heatloss-proof windows, then buy ours, but if you're not bothered about any of those things, then go for someone elses". The Showhome quote came in at £11,000 (don't forget including the non-guaranteed £2500). A bewildering array of subsidies (5 in all I think), designed to making you think that £11,000 is what you'll pay, but you can guarantee that they wouldn't honour those for arbitary reasons when it came to pay. He did the whole "I'll ring my manager" routine. Got it down to £7,000. Never in a million years would I trust a company who can drop their pants that quickly. A price is a price, with a bit of leeway, but that's just ridiculous. It scares me that some people don't haggle and go for the first price. Then there was the finance offer as well. 1.9%. yeah right!!!!! No paperwork to back this up.

Zenith are clearly very good at what they do, thats not selling quality windows at fair prices, but using finely-tuned sales tactics to bully customers into paying a premium. They clearly quote way over the odds to make it seem like their products are in a different league, then bring the price down to lure you in and make it attractive. Plus the Showhome thing - I can't believe that's even legal. I am a salesperson myself and would never ever use these techniques in a million years. PLEASE ZENITH, IF YOU'RE READING THIS, LISTEN TO YOUR CUSTOMERS!!!! HOW CAN YOU SLEEP AT NIGHT?????? There is just no need to resort to these kinds of techniques in this day and age.

All I can say is shop around, and be very open-minded with salesmen, and trust your gut, if it feels a bit wrong, then it probably is. I felt satisfied last night that we'd stuck to our guns. Now I fear though, the onslaught of daily telephone calls will begin.

Bechet45

I had Zenith round a few days ago to talk me through their roofing product but instead got all the selling tactics that have been described in this thread. After a ninty minute sales pitch and measure up, they started at £7000-odd (in order to dazzle me with huge discounts) but we soon cut to the chase and his bottom figure was £4700 if I signed there and then. I said I wanted some time over-night to look at moving money around and the salesman instantly transformed into 'not nice', packed his kit and stormed out as if it were HIS home! Fifty-five minutes later his manager phoned and offered a further £500 off. I gave him the 'never darken my door again' routine.

Two days later Head Office called asking (all innocent and doe-eyed tone) for feed-back on my experience. She picked upon my every cue and kept apologising of behalf of Zenith. She then offered to make amends by having Commercial Branch visit me - to check the measurements and give me a quote with all the commissions stripped out. I agreed.

My family thought I would be doing well to get the job for £3500. I wanted less than £3200. I used the time till the appointment to get a local quote (£2050) from my measurements and photos sent by email and an Everest quote - they came on Sunday (£5500).

Commercial Branch from Walton-on-Thames duly turned up this morning. The job was measured again and priced again. £9900 this time! - but that isn't the price they'd ask me to pay. They started with £2800 - £400 less than I had hoped to achieve with effort. Poker Face time! £2700 next. Settled at £2500.

No more Council House contracts cancelled, No more Army Barracks contracts cancelled. Just plain "our commercial price with all the Branch commissions stripped out" (that phrase again).

Same product, same spec., same fitters, same everything except the price. Their profit is still in there, clearly, but £2500 instead of £4700 is money saving in my spread sheet!

This post was going to be about picking a fight with the local salesman so he goes off in a huff and get yourself referred to Commercial Branch but having read the other posts, it's become what it is - another view and experience. For my money, it's about getting referred to Commercial Branch and saving a bundle - and I don't care if Commercial Branch shares a desk with the original salesman from Local Branch.

maninthestreet

Bechet45 wrote: »

I had Zenith round a few days ago to talk me through their roofing product but instead got all the selling tactics that have been described in this thread. After a ninty minute sales pitch and measure up, they started at £7000-odd (in order to dazzle me with huge discounts) but we soon cut to the chase and his bottom figure was £4700 if I signed there and then. I said I wanted some time over-night to look at moving money around and the salesman instantly transformed into 'not nice', packed his kit and stormed out as if it were HIS home! Fifty-five minutes later his manager phoned and offered a further £500 off. I gave him the 'never darken my door again' routine.

Two days later Head Office called asking (all innocent and doe-eyed tone) for feed-back on my experience. She picked upon my every cue and kept apologising of behalf of Zenith. She then offered to make amends by having Commercial Branch visit me - to check the measurements and give me a quote with all the commissions stripped out. I agreed.

My family thought I would be doing well to get the job for £3500. I wanted less than £3200. I used the time till the appointment to get a local quote (£2050) from my measurements and photos sent by email and an Everest quote - they came on Sunday (£5500).

Commercial Branch from Walton-on-Thames duly turned up this morning. The job was measured again and priced again. £9900 this time! - but that isn't the price they'd ask me to pay. They started with £2800 - £400 less than I had hoped to achieve with effort. Poker Face time! £2700 next. Settled at £2500.

No more Council House contracts cancelled, No more Army Barracks contracts cancelled. Just plain "our commercial price with all the Branch commissions stripped out" (that phrase again).

Same product, same spec., same fitters, same everything except the price. Their profit is still in there, clearly, but £2500 instead of £4700 is money saving in my spread sheet!

This post was going to be about picking a fight with the local salesman so he goes off in a huff and get yourself referred to Commercial Branch but having read the other posts, it's become what it is - another view and experience. For my money, it's about getting referred to Commercial Branch and saving a bundle - and I don't care if Commercial Branch shares a desk with the original salesman from Local Branch.

So you paid £450 more than a compatable quote from a local firm?

ormus

i wouldnt be doing business with any company that tried to rip me off, for 7k, 9k or 4.7k.
i just dont understand some peeps.