Hillarys Blinds
reviews and complaints

I purchased vertical blinds for my patio doors on the17/09/2019.
I had a problem with one of the slatts that kept twisting so phoned customer service to inform them of my problem.
I was told that it was not a problem it " just needs resetting " so whilst on the phone the young lady told me how to reset the slatts, I expressed my concern at the time that I was not happy with how hard I had to pull the cord in order to reset it as I was worried it would snap therefore where would that leave me should this happen.
I was told the blinds were still under guarantee therefore they would be fixed within a week as I suspected the cord snapped thats when the fun and games began.
I called back to customer services with whom I spoke to one of the managers to explain my issue.
I was told that due to there being a shortage of staff it would be a while before a fitter would be in my area to fix this blind.
I explained that I was not happy with the situation and found it a bit poor to have to wait an unknown amount of time to have a faulty product repaired this is where the customer service from this company shows its true colours when she said
" what do you expect me to do? let somebody else down who are expecting their product to be fitted? how would you feel if that was you? "
I could go on and on with the appalling service recieved by this person.
I had a call informing me that a fitter would be arriving today 07/03/2020 low and behold I had a call to say the fitter could not make it so they will have to reschedule a new appointment so I am still waiting for the said blind to be fixed.
I have had Hillarys blinds fitted in two previous houses this company in my opinion has gone down hill dramatically!
I will never be recommending them to anybody.
Rude unhelpful staff, beware once they have taken your money they are not interested!

Hillarys Reference: 9358842

There are two make to mature Black Out Blind I have ordered to Hillarys through their sales man, who done all the measurement and placed the order in October 2019.

I have confirmed with him these has to be black out Blinds as one of the blind is for bedroom. Once he received the blinds from his Company (Hillarys) he bring the make to mature Blinds both of them to my house and installed by himself.

One of the Blind for my living room is perfect.

The one for my bedroom blind is SHORT and has less WIDTH which I am not happy about. The sales man may took the the wrong measurement as a result the blind did not fit good enough to cover the length and width of window.

At night the light from outside been flood through to my bedroom which is an inconvenience and difficulties for our sleep. My wife who been Ill just because of not sleeping enough at night.

I have spoken to Hillarys several times to send some one to my house and make their own inquiries to ratify this fault to their blind and take the balance.

Which does not take much of their attention. They only after money for a their faulty Blind.

Suzanne from West Midlands came during black Friday sale booking she measured gave quote I signed machine confirming price £120 she then said she made mistake it is £15 more!she then said her card reader and mobile phone was dead could she take my car charger for the day as she has many customers to visit!I refused fitting was arranged for today 20 December.I called you to report incident your gentleman said he had no order for one kitchen vertical grey blind, no price, no ref etc ?I cancelled order via email because I am concerned I received email you would email me I am disabled with impaired hearing, no email? Then fitter turned up, he just entered my house walked into my kitchen without being invited I was in nightclothes because I am ill I found this very upsetting, he said you had not been in contact with him!I find this disgraceful service, I needed blind fitted for Christmas with shutters and conservatory blinds new year but I have no faith in Hillary's blinds I look forward to hearing from you via email

10 blinds ordered
8 ok
french door blinds awful as pattern does not align.
my neighbour has exactly same windows and her supplier ( much cheaper) aligned both her blinds beautifully.
I dont lower my blinds on the French doors as people notice the defect straight away. Not a good advert for Hillarys.
I would like this resolved and the blinds replaced for blinds that match and is to the standard that Hillarys advertise.

I bought vertical blinds from Hilary Blinds about 4 years ago. I contacted them last week to get the turner rod reconnected to the rail as the blinds wouldn't open or close. He came and said the he would have to order it as the one he brought was the newer one and it wouldn't fit. Please see email below regarding same. I am frustrated as you can't just tell a customer that they need to get new blinds because they don't have the fitting to fix them. I see on the internet that you say your blinds are guaranteed for 5 years. This is in contrast to you stating that there's nothing you can do. You have to be able to get this fitting from somewhere and help sort this for me. I paid a lot of money for these blinds. I'm disgusted with this response and attitude.

From: Irish Service [mailto:Irish.Service@hillarys.co.uk]
Sent: 05 November 2019 14:24
To: Larkin, Eve
Cc: [protected]@gmail.com
Subject: RE: replacement head rail 7912539

Hi eve

The only thing that we can suggest is a whole new blind and this would need to be priced by an advisor.
We don't hold any pricing here in the office

Many thanks
Jennifer

From: Larkin, Eve [mailto:Eve.[protected]@hse.ie]
Sent: 05 November 2019 14:11
To: Irish Service
Cc: Agent 315316
Subject: RE: replacement head rail 7912539

But I need to be able to open and close my blind? What do you suggest I do or is there anywhere else I can get this rail? How much would it cost to put on new rail?

Kind Regards
Eve

Eve Larkin
Clinical Coder / Assistant Staff Officer
HIPE Office
Midland Regional Hospital Tullamore
Ph: [protected]
Email: eve.[protected]@hse.ie

From: Irish Service [mailto:Irish.Service@hillarys.co.uk]
Sent: 05 November 2019 14:11
To: Larkin, Eve
Cc: [protected]@gmail.com
Subject: replacement head rail 7912539

Hi eve

I have had an email from our advisor David who was with you recently at a service call.
He has contacted us to see if it is possible to replace the headrail for your vertical blind.
I have emailed our vertical department and unfortunately the rail that you have we no longer make and we have no more in stock.
This means that we cannot supply a replacement part for your blind

Apologies that we cannot help any further
Jennifer
Hillarys customer service

Hillarys Blinds is a limited company registered in England and Wales. Registration number: 1196432. Registered Office: Colwick Business Park, Nottingham, NG4 2JR

This message (and any associated files) is intended for the use of the named addressee(s) and may contain information that is confidential, subject to copyright or constitutes a trade secret. If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, copying or distribution of this message, or files associated with the message, is strictly prohibited. If you have received this message in error, please notify us immediately by replying to the message and deleting it from your computer. Any views or opinions presented are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of the company.

Please note that Hillarys Blinds may monitor email traffic data and also the content of email for the purposes of security and staff training.
...

Customer number 9237503
Date purchase June 26, 2019
Date installed Sept 18, 2019

I honestly admit I signed the paper. However, it was not the one I am expecting as a result. I didn't understand about the panel? I mentioned that I don't want a big one. No actual visualisation showed only sketch with right and left so I signed. I even explained through my words and through pictures. I knew I agreed to the plan but in our conversation I thought we agreed what was said will be exactly same shutter design I wanted. As I have no much idea with regards to shutter Either way you could just show me pictures or draft how will it look like when it's done like 2d etc so I can amend before installation happened. I am sorry if I was complaining because I was not fully satisfied and happy of the product and it cost £1000 to see everyday in my living room. I called your staff and all of them said they cannot do about it anymore or even remodel. I am humbly asking I am willing to purchase a new design for my living room as long as u help me remodel or move the existing shutter either to one of my windows upstairs the only thing the length measurement is slightly smaller than the existing order. Please help me because I spent a lot of money for this. Thank you very much.

Attached here was the finished product and the one I showed through text.

Order: H4261 / ELTONFL 112897

I placed an order worth £2000 on Friday 9th November.

Firstly I was told at the time I booked the appointment that I would get a further 10% off which didn't happen. I contacted Hillarys within 48 hours of placing this order but was told it had been included - the advisor never mentioned this and so I don't believe this was applied.

Secondly I was told the fitting would take 5 weeks which was a bit of a shock. The reason for using a company like Hillarys was to get curtains and blinds into my new house as quickly as possible.

Thirdly the fitting day was booked for Friday 7th December. At 4.54pm on Thursday 6th December I received a call telling me that one pair of curtains wasn't available and would not be fitted. After 5 weeks! The advisor did not know which pair it was and initially told me it was one pair when in fact it was another!

Finally during fitting last Friday it transpired that the advisor had ordered the wrong size for my bedroom - he had ordered 108cm drop instead of 180cm drop. An honest mistake and he has provided me with a spare pair but I expected better.

I am in the process of divorce, I am a newly single mother, I am on a budget and I opted to use Hillarys as I expected a professional, efficient and high quality personal service. Kevin did his best on Friday but I am left very disappointed with spare badly fitting curtains on two of the windows two weeks before Christmas.

I expect some sort of offer of recompense for my inconvenience. Every other supplier over the past couple of months that I have come into contact with has been fantastic and it is ironic that the most expensive one, Hillarys, has not been and has let me down.

I await your response and will be expecting recompense for this mess.

Hayley Williams

Didn't turn up for the appointment. Agent said they were outside the shop next to my flat. When I went down to let them in they weren't there. I called and they kept lying and saying they were 5 minutes away. I waited outside for 40 minutes. Eventually they stopped answering and cancelled the appointment as they said they couldn't find the flat. The call centre had an unhelpful attitude. Avoid them!

Would never buy from Hillary's blinds again. Stay away! Ordered shutters and blinds on 17th May and still waiting for a fitting date! They happily have taken almost £1500 deposit on the day of ordering and offered a fitting date within minutes by click of a button! Fitting cancelled twice! Having taken leave from work on 9th August for fitting and no one turning up on the day, I had to call the fitter to find out that he left the company and someone should have contacted me! After calling customer services (mostly bunch of staff who can't care less (with the exception of may be one or two people) 6x in a month to re-arrange fitting, new date was finally set on 1st October. This was also cancelled 3 days before due date. Days passed and no one contacted me! Emailed customer services on the 12th who then referred me to reallocation team! Another incompetent department within the company! I was offered to either cancel after waiting for almost 5months or £250 max good will for cancellation of appointments as ‘final offer'! I expressed my dissatisfaction and requested escalation of my complaint and received no response! Obviously staff working at Hillary's doesn't care about anything! Complete dysfunctional company! Hillary's quotes; ‘due to the availability in your area oi have not been able to local a installer to take over the Installation. I am working with the Field Installation Manager to resolve this so that I can contact you with dates that we can offer' costumer service quotes ‘ field installation manager is driving we are unable to speak with him' ‘ field installation manager can't take a call now' etc.. etc then no one calls back!

Morning,
I have spent over 2 year painstakingly renovating my house and decided to spent £2500 on curtains to get a high quality finish.

Issues.
1. All the curtains are fitted at different heights - from ceiling/window and radiator.
2. Brackets - see pictures. (one not straight, different screws.)
3. All curtains are joined not one piece of material - not large curtains.
4. Wall repair works needed! (filling/sanding/painting) brand new carpet just fitted!

The fitter Simon Chappel - I have spoken to and he is coming round to go through.

I bought 18 Roman blinds and 4 Curtains back in October 2017. At the time of sale I was promised that I would get one year quibble free warranty in case of any issues with the blinds.

I have recently noticed that one of the blinds has little damage to it and one of the blinds had sewing fault and is not looking flush at one edge.

I called and sent an email to Hillarys with the following response from Hillarys. :-)

"As discussed on the phone I am emailing yourself regards to your enquiry to your Venetian blind damage and Roman blind stitching. When upon fitting the blinds the Advisor would do an overall examination of the blinds inside and out. If anything was found he would remove the blinds and order replacements. As this damage is reported ten months after the fitting we would deem this as customer misue to the product. If the damage was reported two months later, we would gladly send an Advisor out to fix the problems.

As it is ten months later we would not be able to do anything further."

I called Hillary Blinds to come and give me a quotation in January 2018, the representative fixed an appointment and visited. he took measurements and gave me a quotation. several weeks later the representative called again and asked for payment, at this point I told him I wasn't interested anymore.
A few months later I received a bill for £624. I never bought anything and I was subsequently taken to court. Really not sure how to deal with this but I am contesting it. This is causing a lot of distress for me. Claim Reference is E8GD97V3

Initial sales appt. 22nd March 2018
Measurements taken 20th April
Fitting day Fri 13th July
At 8.00pm that day the fitter called to say that his previous job had over-run & was unable to do ours. We were going on holiday the next day so gave the fitter my father-in-law's tel. no. so they could arrange a convenient fitting day between them while we were away.
Came back 2 weeks later, no shutters. The fitter had not been in touch. He called me on Fri 27th July to say he had been sacked and still had the shutters in his garage.
My first call to Hillarys was on Monday 30th July, They told me the fitter was no longer with the company and they were trying to locate the shutters. They would call me when they had an update.
My next call was 31st July. They would call me when they had an update.
I called the fitter to ask if the shutters had been picked up, they had been picked up on 30th July.
I rang Hillarys and told them this, they said they would persue it and call me back with an update.
I left it a week and called them back on 6th Aug, they still had no information for me, they would call me when they could find a fitter to fit the shutters.
Still I had no call, so I called them again on 10th Aug. I would now be marked as priority and an Acct Manager I had spoken to previously (Brandon) had been emailed to please contact me.
Again no call, so called again on 15th Aug. Apparently i'm not in Brandon's area, so I need to wait for an acct. manager for my area to get in contact.
As I have got nowhere with customer svc, I called the Sales Rep that initially came round, he told me the fitters were very busy, but that someone was down to call me today, 16th Aug. No call.
It's now been 5 weeks to the day that our shutters were supposed to have been fitted and i've not had one call to either apologise or explain or update me with why it's taking so long.
Please help me.

For nearly a year I have been promised by Hillary's to correct their faulty blinds. They were incorrectly fitted and are damaged every time I open the window.
After lots of messages, calls and promises this issue still is not resolved. The representatives blatantly lie and do not reply.

Yet again another call to head office is required but can't until Monday as closed. Another wasted Saturday waiting for this to be fixed.

Tracey McWilliams
97 Farmers Way
Cox Green
Maidenhead
Berkshire
SL 63PU
[protected]

Order Number - CAH 1883 - 102 St Chands Road, Cox Green, Maidenhead, Berkshire, SL6 3BA

I am writing on behalf of my mother Tina Norris, your Customer Services team called her to confirm I could talk to you on her behalf.

My mother ordered a carpet for her lounge, dinning room, hall stairs and landing. The sales contact Jane contacted a fitting colleague to be sure the carpet could be fitted around the chair lift when in situ and she confirmed that it could.

Jane suggested that, depending on traffic, the fitters would be with her around 08:00 on 22nd June. By 11:00 no one had arrived and my 74 year old mother had been sitting there for 3 hours without any contact whatsoever from the customer service team or fitters.

My mother called Jane to ask what had happened. Jane was not free so she spoke to Colin Alltree who told her the carpet fitters were not scheduled to come and what's more the fit was never scheduled to go ahead.

It transpired that the person who Jane thought was able to fit the stair carpet around the lift had left the company. It was also confirmed the reason my mother had not been called was due to her case "slipping through the net". This is totally unacceptable.

This carpet change was a massive issue for my vulnerable, 74 year old mother, who has been so excited about the carpet change and moving her furniture out. We were excited for her and it was great to see her so happy. I cannot believe that you have no processes in place to ensure that when an order is not raised - for whatever reason - the customer who made the order and has paid for the order is not told and has to go out of her way to be told that the order is not coming. One can only assume that if my mother had not have called, the company would not have had the processes in place to realise their mistake meaning that your company would have effectively taken money from a vulnerable pensioner without providing any service in return. This goes beyond unacceptable into a total disgrace.

On speaking myself to Colin, he said my mother had cancelled the order and it was logged as mis-sold. He also stated Hilary's had refunded her in full.

Colin seemed to think this was a kindness that we should have been delighted with. Delighted would have been compensation of an amount that would have alleviated the distress not a £50 voucher for Hilary's. You cannot possibly think that after the way you have treated my mother that she would ever purchase anything from you again. It was a final insult to the turgid affair. Indeed, even if she had decided to purchase something from you the voucher would have not covered the cost of anything from your company.

There are three clear failing within Hilary's that arise because of my mother's case:

1) Poor customer service - not informing customers of what is happening with their order
2) Having no processes in place to automatically identify when orders are not going to be delivered but payment has already been made
3) The aftercare you provide to customers who have made a complaint

I think you will agree that these are pretty sizeable failings and I think it is beholden on your organisation to provide a clear action plan for solving these issues.

It is also important that you provide my mother with suitable compensation for providing awful customer service, potentially taking her money without providing a service in return and very poor after care.

I look forward to receiving your response, with details of the action plan for addressing these three areas within your organisation.

Yours sincerely
Tracey McWilliams

I sent a recorded delivery email that has been signed for and on July 4th and nothing at all from the, in response

Shutters are the wrong colour!
Salesman also lied to get a more expensive sale, I've since learned that they work on commission!
I've emailed numerous times but Hillarys customer service have just threatened me even though I'm pregnant and have a valid complaint! They point blank refuse to put me through to a manager.
Worlds worst company to deal with!

I have bought a 1930's house and had lots of work. The worst mistake was asking Hillarys to help. I have a duel aspect window and needs some advice.

The 'advisor' suggested I should 'brick the window up'. I should have listened to my gut about him but ordered curtains and 2 x blinds.

When he arrived to fit them everything was too much trouble. I noticed threadbare holes in the curtains. he said he would have them replaced.

I spoke to customer services the next morning and asked for another fitter. Since then nothing. I have emailed and called more times than any company I have ever been a customer of before. no one wants to help, im told to call then im told to email. My 'account manager' is never there or calls me back. I cant speak to a manager. They have my money so it feels like they don't care. I still have curtains with holes that the light shines through and so many pulls in my bedroom blinds, I haven't even started on that yet. Im pulling my hair out and its made me cry

An email, phone call and confirmation text message took place to confirm the date and time of my consultation. I waited in and no one turned up, no courtesy call was had.

I emailed and complained of which a pathetic email was received back.

Since then 3 separate advisors have called, emailed and text every day for 3 days even after a have expressed my disgust and told them not to contact me again!

Fitted blinds and made to pay before fitter left not being able to check them properly.
Whilst cleaning up after the fitter I noticed cracked beading he said he would replace and didn't notice when he fitted it after husband inspected found a strained joint and cracked frame where attached to window we've tried speaking to both the salesman and the fitter and was assured he would get back to us and that the beading needed ordering and it would be 2 weeks when on the day I was informed they kept them in stock in the warehouse so after another two weeks waiting we've tried to get back in touch they will not let us speak with a manager and it's gotten to the point where we just want the shutters out and money refunded and any windows damaged to be repaired or replaced we will also have to wait for another company to re make shutters and wait to be fitted as a company that has been going for so long I am absolutely disgusted at the so-called aftercare and the disregard to our complaint

I have recently had 4000 worth of blinds and shutters installed by hillarys.

The shutters are incorrect colour.

I have emailed many times chasing for a resolution finally got a manager to visit us who agreed they were incorrect and the salesman did not show us the correct sales info to make an informed decision. Since then for weeks I have chased via email to resolve finally weeks later receiving an email threatening me with debt collection and they have now decided they were not wrong? I have 100s of email begging to resolve even now emailing the ceo still no response : (please help me