Tony Hetherington is Financial Mail on Sunday’s ace investigator, fighting readers corners, revealing the truth that lies behind closed doors and winning victories for those who have been left out-of-pocket. Find out how to contact him below.
P.B.G. writes: In April last year, I paid Sash Home Improvements £9,600 to replace all the double glazing in my home.
One of the windows leaked during bad weather so I contacted the company to claim a repair under its ten-year guarantee. I was told it had gone into liquidation and the guarantee would not be honoured.
I then found that Sash had been dissolved in 2016 and replaced since then by a series of companies with the same Bolton works address and involving members of the same family. Can companies really avoid their obligations simply by reinventing themselves like this?
Opaque: The Primefold doors (right) and Bolton businessman Peter Gray
Sash has more lives than a particularly lucky cat. If you go back far enough, there was a business in Huddersfield that used the Sash Windows name. It folded about seven years ago and one of its creditors, Premier Conservatory Supplies Limited, adopted the name. Premier was run by Bolton businessman Peter Gray, until he put it into liquidation in July last year. Gray also ran Sash Home Improvements Limited, which he set up in 2013. It was compulsorily struck off by Companies House in February 2016.
But you would not know this from the website of Sash Home Improvements, which continued to advertise that the business was ‘founded two decades ago’. Gray told me that he left the running of Sash to his employees, including all marketing. His only interest for some time was the orders they would bring in for Premier.
Then early last year, Premier’s main supplier collapsed, and Gray has told me that ‘effectively, Premier Conservatory Supplies became insolvent’. His answer was to put it into liquidation last July and set up a new company, Premier Conservatory and Glazing Supplies, which took over the name Sash Home Improvements.
But this collapsed too. Gray told me he blames ‘a terrible supplier’. He quit as a director and the company went into liquidation last December. The story is not quite over though. For last October, along came Prime Glazing Supplies Limited, set up by one of Gray’s salesmen who quit within weeks.
This latest company, which operates from the same Bolton address, is registered to William Gray, the 78-year-old father of Peter Gray, who told me: ‘My father took on the business and I am helping to run the sales element.’
So, when you contacted what you thought was the same business, at the same address, you were told: ‘We are very sorry to inform you that the company you purchased your goods from went into administration on November 24, 2019, and therefore the guarantees given by the company you dealt with are no longer applicable.’
This is serious stuff. For a start, the van that brought the glazing supplies to your door was decorated with the logo of FENSA, the industry trade body, yet FENSA’s list of accredited businesses shows no mention of Gray’s firm.
I asked Gray about this, and he blamed an employee who ‘took it upon himself’.
But even if we ignore this, what about the original paperwork you were given, which offers an insurance-backed ‘fully underwritten ten years guarantee’? Who is the insurer? Who underwrites the guarantee? I asked Gray, but he came up with no answers.
The best he could offer was to say he would visit you ‘and look at helping get any repairs done’. So what happened to the fully underwritten ten-year guarantee backed by insurers? Or was that just a sales tool?
As for the latest company, Prime Glazing Supplies, its website displays an impressive series of pictures. For example, there is Primefold, a system of folding glass doors, with the claim that, ‘We are delighted to be your manufacturer for Primefold.’
You might think that Prime Glazing installed the doors shown. It didn’t. Exactly the same picture was being used in advertising by a completely different company in the US as long ago as 2018, before Prime Glazing even existed. Gray explained that the images came from various suppliers, with no intention to suggest they were installations by Prime Glazing.
But that still leaves Prime Glazing’s own terms and conditions. These offer what seems to be a loyalty scheme called ‘Premier Club’, with the explanation that, ‘The scheme is operated by Premier Glazing Supplies Limited.’ Yet according to Companies House, there is no such British company. Perhaps it is next on the list to be formed!
Whether or not you accept Gray’s offer to help with repairs is up to you of course. The blunt fact is that you were deceived into a contract that offered a rock solid guarantee that turned out not to exist. Gray was in charge when his company tricked you. He has assured me there was no intention to do this. Let’s see if he stands up to his word.
Together, we get a result
Ms E.T. writes: My house was divided into two flats over 30 years ago. The upper flat is occupied by a customer of Together Energy.
I live in the lower flat and have never been a customer of Together Energy. Nevertheless, for several months Together Energy used the direct debit system to take £147 a month from my Santander account.
I have sent numerous emails and made numerous calls, requesting a refund, and while the company agrees a mistake was made, it has not refunded my money.
Shocking: Ms E.T. has sent numerous emails and made numerous calls to Together Energy, requesting a refund,
Together Energy told me you and your daughter did telephone to enquire about transferring to it from your existing electricity supplier. However, staff failed to update the National Grid database that shows which company supplies which customers.
You told me that you do not agree with this, but as Together Energy failed to register you as a customer and, after I made contact, it has now refunded all your money.
Santander told me that when you queried the direct debits, it should have moved faster to apply the indemnity scheme, so it has sent you an apology and £50 to make up for this.
If you believe you are the victim of financial wrongdoing, write to Tony Hetherington at Financial Mail, 2 Derry Street, London W8 5TS or email [email protected]. Because of the high volume of enquiries, personal replies cannot be given. Please send only copies of original documents, which we regret cannot be returned.
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