Autoglass v National Windscreens

paulpud

A few days ago one of our work vans' windscreens cracked badly when hit by a stone and with its MOT looming we needed to get it fixed pretty quickly. We were provided with a telephone number by our fleet insurer which turned out to be Autoglass, their approved repairer.

The van is used for small installation/maintenance work so is never in one place for very long, and we often don't know where it will be until the day before so we asked if we could take it somewhere for the replacement screen, but I was told the engineer had to come to us. So I asked about the earliest opportunity it could be done so we could try and give them an address where it could be, but that was no good either because they couldn't give us an estimated time without a definite address first - a classic chicken and egg situation. To quickly resolve what seemed a hopeless situation, our employee agreed to have it done at his home either in an evening or on Saturday morning and I gave Autoglass his number so they could liaise with him directly.

The following morning he let us know he'd received confirmation that the screen would be replaced on the 25th April, almost two weeks away and 5 days after the expiration of the MOT. This was the earliest it could be done apparently. Having failed to get through to them on the phone twice I tried the website and noticed that appointments could be booked online also, so I put in the details and was offered various fitting slots. I selected a week earlier, 19th April, received a confirmation email and the promise of a follow up call. 2 days later, having yet to receive the call, I contacted them, explained the situation and asked about the status of our appointment, to which I was promised a call back within a couple of hours. Having still not received the call at the end of the day I again rang again, to be told the reason they didn't bother calling is because the job couldn't be done on the 19th and our original appointment on the 26th was still the earliest it could be done.

Feeling somewhat underwhelmed, I looked for an alternative and contacted National Windscreens as they indicated on their website that they could deal direct with our insurers also. I asked how soon it could be done and was given the number of our local branch to ring. They told me it could be done at 8.30am the following day at an address of our choice or taken to their branch. To keep it simple the van was taken to them as it was only 10 minutes away and 2 hours later they called to take payment for the excess and VAT and the van was ready for collection.

So a big thumbs up for good service from National Windscreens and we shall never entertain using Autoglass ever again.

bod1467

That's not the first time I've read here similar things about Autoglass. It would seem they've grown too big too quick and haven't boosted the service side to keep pace.