Double glazing company charging a call-out fee to replace a guaranteed item

Jim02

Hi all,

Five years ago I had a conservatory installed. The guarantee on the panels and workmanship is 25 years.

A couple of months ago I noticed that one of the glass panels had misted. Looking at it, it's pretty clear this is due to a manufacturing fault as the internal seal is distorted.

I arranged a service call, and eventually, today an engineer arrived. The first thing he did was to tell me there was a flat fee of £85 for a call-out. I disputed this and sent him on his way.

Neither my original contract nor my guarantee certificate mention a call-out charge. They do mention labour charges which I'm happy to accept (as the engineer told me it would be about ten minutes' work).

My question is this: Can a company arbitrarily charge a call-out fee to replace something that is defective and under guarantee?

Ebe_Scrooge

I suspect they would class the call-out fee as "labour".  To be fair, even if it's 10 minutes' work to fix the problem, someone has to pay for his time to travel to and from your house, which could easily be an hour's round trip.

Sandtree

Callout is a labour fee... they often, though not always, cover the first X minutes/hours.

A guarantee is in additional to any statutory rights and they are free to put whatever conditions they want in terms of what you have to contribute.

Go down the route of your statutory rights against the company that sold it to you and they cannot charge you for callout or labour (though they can ask you to get a report to prove its faulty but this cost can be added to your claim)

Jim02

Ebe_Scrooge said:

I suspect they would class the call-out fee as "labour".  To be fair, even if it's 10 minutes' work to fix the problem, someone has to pay for his time to travel to and from your house, which could easily be an hour's round trip.

Yep, that would make sense, apart from in my contract it says, "[after the first year after installation] our service engineer’s time on site will be charged at the prevailing labour rate.” (my emphasis). So they can't claim travel time and anyway, why is their travel time my problem? It's their workmanship that's caused the problem. I'd expect to pay a call-out if I want them to replace a window that I'd thrown a cricket ball through. But not for a defect!

Jim02

Sandtree said:

Callout is a labour fee... they often, though not always, cover the first X minutes/hours.

A guarantee is in additional to any statutory rights and they are free to put whatever conditions they want in terms of what you have to contribute.

Go down the route of your statutory rights against the company that sold it to you and they cannot charge you for callout or labour (though they can ask you to get a report to prove its faulty but this cost can be added to your claim)

Thanks, I'll look into that!

Although, are you saying that they can put additional conditions onto the guarantee after they've given me the guarantee certificate?

Thrugelmir

Jim02 said:

Ebe_Scrooge said:

I suspect they would class the call-out fee as "labour".  To be fair, even if it's 10 minutes' work to fix the problem, someone has to pay for his time to travel to and from your house, which could easily be an hour's round trip.

It's their workmanship that's caused the problem.

The manufacturer of the units would have been outsourced. 

Jim02

Thrugelmir said:

Jim02 said:

Ebe_Scrooge said:

I suspect they would class the call-out fee as "labour".  To be fair, even if it's 10 minutes' work to fix the problem, someone has to pay for his time to travel to and from your house, which could easily be an hour's round trip.

It's their workmanship that's caused the problem.

The manufacturer of the units would have been outsourced. 

Actually not in this case, they make their own stuff. But I don't think it would matter - they're selling the units so they're responsible for the quality.

greenface2

would they have charged you another £85 when they returned to fit it . I am surprised that they have put 25yrs on glass it is normally just 5 . Did they tell you when you requested a service engineer to call it would be ££ 

NSG666

Jim02 said:

Ebe_Scrooge said:

I suspect they would class the call-out fee as "labour".  To be fair, even if it's 10 minutes' work to fix the problem, someone has to pay for his time to travel to and from your house, which could easily be an hour's round trip.

Yep, that would make sense, apart from in my contract it says, "[after the first year after installation] our service engineer’s time on site will be charged at the prevailing labour rate.” (my emphasis). So they can't claim travel time and anyway, why is their travel time my problem? It's their workmanship that's caused the problem. I'd expect to pay a call-out if I want them to replace a window that I'd thrown a cricket ball through. But not for a defect!

Doesn't that then mean that after the 1st year the warranty is for parts only? That's fairly typical in my old world of plumbing where you buy say a tap which comes with a 12 month parts and labour warranty followed by a further 9 years of a parts only warranty.