sliding door Window shatter - help - who pays???!!

jodent

 A few weeks ago my husband came home to find the inner middle pane of our (less than 2 year old) sliding doors had shattered.

The company who fitted the door have said that it must be accidental (eg a bird or something hit and cannot be the heat) and that if there was a manufacture error then this would have happened soon afterwards
The insurance company have said it was the heat and therefore not covered under accidental damage.

We are currently looking at footing the bill for £800 to have in replaced.

Any advice? who do i believe? Who do i push more to sort it out as no one can prove it either way as far as i can see.
It does feel unfair though that we are the ones who are going to have to pay

advice gratefully recieved

EssexExile

£800 for a sealed unit, have you had other quotes?

I think you pay unless you can prove a manufacturing fault. What does the wording of your guarantee say?

grumbler

jodent said:

The company who fitted the door have said that it must be accidental (eg a bird ...

LOL. Twice I tried to walk through my closed sliding patio door - and it survived.

tacpot12

What was the temperature on the day the breakage occured? Given the temperatures we had in the UK not much more than a month ago, excess temperature and expansion could have been the cause if the day was exceptionally hot.

How do you know that the glass wasn't broken by a burglar attempting to break in?  

Bendy_House

Inner middle pane was broken.

Weird bird. Weird burglar. :-)

FreeBear

tacpot12 said: What was the temperature on the day the breakage occured? Given the temperatures we had in the UK not much more than a month ago, excess temperature and expansion could have been the cause if the day was exceptionally hot.

If there had been a small chip or scratch in the glass acting as a stress point, the thermal expansion could well have been the trigger needed. Unfortunately, now that the glass has shattered, it will be next to impossible to proof a chip or scratch was there.

As for a bird strike, we have suicidal pigeons here that regularly fly in to windows at full pelt. No broken windows. Double & triple glazed units are incredibly tough, and a brick will more often than not, just bounce off if you were to throw one at a window.

Apodemus

FreeBear said:

tacpot12 said: What was the temperature on the day the breakage occured? Given the temperatures we had in the UK not much more than a month ago, excess temperature and expansion could have been the cause if the day was exceptionally hot.

 Double & triple glazed units are incredibly tough, and a brick will more often than not, just bounce off if you were to throw one at a window.

...unless you manage to hit it near a corner, as a double glazing salesman once did in our front room when showing us how unbreakable the units were!  

Doozergirl

Apodemus said:

FreeBear said:

tacpot12 said: What was the temperature on the day the breakage occured? Given the temperatures we had in the UK not much more than a month ago, excess temperature and expansion could have been the cause if the day was exceptionally hot.

 Double & triple glazed units are incredibly tough, and a brick will more often than not, just bounce off if you were to throw one at a window.

...unless you manage to hit it near a corner, as a double glazing salesman once did in our front room when showing us how unbreakable the units were!  

The bigger the pane, the less likely to break it is.   A sliding door should be much harder to break than a demo unit.  

We have building regulations exactly for the reason that we want people protected if they walk into a window.   Birds are covered by default by that.  

I think it's BS using birds as an excuse but that doesn't automatically make it the manufacturer's fault.  

On balance I'd say it would have something to do with the weather and a minor imperfection somewhere caused at an unknown point.  

I think £800 might be a bit high as well.  Worth getting a price from a local glazier - not a polished double glazing sales outfit.  

Mr.Generous

It will have been toughened glass, and that can shatter hours after an impact, I would think the inner glass got a hard impact some time before it shattered. Measure it up and get a quote, sealed units are always easy to swap over and it wont be £800 or anything like that. Get one of those window medic guys to quote you.