My New Windows Saga: Pt 2

This is my follow-up rant to my original post about my new windows installation. I figure I can get away with posting this today since everyone is busy with their holiday preparations.

Brief History

At the end of August, I called the local office of a national window company to come to my house and give me an estimate on replacing some or all of my failing windows that came with my 20 year old house. One of my neighbors had used this company to replace his windows a few months earlier, and he was very pleased with the windows and the installation.

A young salesman, a recent college grad, came to my house. Honestly, I don’t really remember too much about what he told me about the company or about the windows. I do remember he told me my house couldn’t have “replacement windows”, it had to have “new construction windows” because of the way the original windows were installed. I didn’t understand why. He also told me the windows would look different from my existing windows, but he didn’t say how.  I foolishly didn’t ask how. But I said to him that I wanted all of the windows on the front of my house to look the same. Duh, right?

What I do remember about our first meeting was that I said I wanted to think about it before signing a contract. The company he represented was the only company I had spoken to, and I thought I should get estimates from at least one other company. He told me that the prices were going up two days later, so I had to decide right away. I fell for that.

I ended up deciding to replace 16 windows, two-thirds of the windows on my house: all the windows on the front of the house, a double set of Palladian windows on one side, the main bathroom window on the first floor on the back of the house, and one of the living room windows on the other side of the house. That left 10 windows that I wasn’t in a hurry to replace.

He wrote up a contract and came back the next day for me to sign it. This was my big mistake. I didn’t read it before I signed it. It had many pages, and I more or less glazed over when I looked at it. He then went around the house measuring the windows. It was a hot day, and I was baking bread so I didn’t follow him around as he measured. I assumed he measured 16 windows. Mistake #2.

The following week, they sent out an older man to remeasure the windows to make sure it was correct. He didn’t tell me how many windows he was measuring. And when I started following him around the house, he snarkily told me he didn’t need me to follow him around. So I went back to doing whatever I had been doing. My mistake #3.

The Next Problem

I told the young salesman that I wanted my windows replaced in November after my garden was finished for the season and before the winter. Several of my old windows wouldn’t stay up from the top and the locks no longer worked, so cold air would get into the house via the two or three inches that the windows were open. I asked him as well as the older man who remeasured if I should call the office to set up a date, and they both told me that someone from the company would call me when they had dates available.

To the best of my knowledge, I never heard from the project manager. I got busy in November because I ended up hosting Thanksgiving at my house. I didn’t call the company to follow up. My mistake #4.

Finally, in early January after the holidays, I called the company and asked to speak to the project manager. I told him I was calling to set up a date for my window installation since I hadn’t heard from him in October or November. He told me he called me in mid-November. I went back and checked the phone logs on both my old landline and my cellphone, and I didn’t see any calls from a number that could have been his. So who knows if he called or not. I definitely did not receive a voicemail message from him because I could not have missed that.

Oh well, let’s let bygones be bygones, right? I set up a date in early April. Of course, it turned out to be during the time that Jeff’s older daughter was visiting. So I called the project manager back and asked to push it back a week. No problem, he said. I’ll call you the day before, he said.

The Prelude to the Installation

Last Sunday, Jeff and I spent 12 hours getting the house ready for the window replacement. That meant removing the curtains and drapes, the custom and store-bought blinds, and all the hardware that held them. The custom blinds were very difficult to remove because they had been in place for two decades, and Jeff was trying to remove them using a manual screwdriver. It was a ton of work for him. Meanwhile, I removed the curtains/drapes and moved all the furniture away from the windows. Ugh.

On Monday, I waited to get the confirmation call. By noon, I hadn’t heard from the project manager so I called the office. Yes, it is scheduled, the woman who answered told me. She said the installer would arrive between 8:30-9:30am rather than between 9:00-10:00am as I had been originally told. 

Because I go to bed very late, I wake up late. I set my alarm for 7:15am so I would be awake, dressed and would have had breakfast by the time the installers arrived. I woke up at 7:15, but I was lying in bed trying to force myself to get up. At 7:30am, I received a text from the installers. They were in my driveway, an hour early! An hour early is good, but I wasn’t ready. I texted him that I would get dressed immediately and let them in in about 10 minutes. 

I hurried, dressed and went out to greet him. First, I was surprised that there wasn’t a company truck in my driveway, just a plain pickup truck. When the salesman and measuring guys came to my house, they were in company branded cars. I asked Luis, the installer, if he worked for the company or if he were a subcontractor. Subcontractor, he said, but he had been working for the company for a long time. OK. 

Next, Luis told me he had 12 windows for me. I said, No, 16. You should have 16 windows. He repeated, No I have 12 windows. I freaked out. We went over the windows that he had, and I realized that the windows for my dining room and the two front windows for the living room were missing. It turns out they were not included in my order! That makes no sense because why would I want the second floor new windows to look different from the first floor windows, especially after the salesman told me they would look different?

At 8:00am, I called the office and spoke to a woman who answered the phone. She told me to call my salesman. I did. He didn’t pick up. He called me back about a half hour later, and with some irritation, he told me my contract was for 12 windows. Obviously, it was my error because I didn’t read the contract carefully to catch his error. What to do?

Jeff told me to let the installers install what they had on the truck. So they got to work.

A hour later, a big company truck pulled up in front of the house, and I got excited thinking maybe they were delivering the 4 missing windows. Unfortunately, not. A nice guy named Jim who lives in my town stopped by to see how things were going. I told him the whole story. He reassured me that the subcontractor, Luis, was one of their best installers. And he told me that they would ask Luis to measure for the other 4 windows and that they wouldn’t charge me an additional “setup fee” and would charge what I paid for the windows in the initial order. At the end of August, the windows were about $1000 each. Not cheap.

The Installation

Luis and his two workmen did an excellent job installing the 12 windows that they had for my house. They only took a 20 minute break for lunch on the first day, and they worked until it got dark. They had been at my house for more than 12 hours. They got the bulk of the work done.

They arrived early the next morning, and by 2:30, they had finished the job. Nice.

What I hadn’t realized is that the excellent wood and aluminum trim around each of the new windows that make the windows look more finished than the original contractor windows added 6″ to the width of the windows. As a result of the larger size window frames, the 12″ wide shutters I had on my house’s original windows no longer fit the windows or fit on the front of the house.

They are not long enough, plus they would overlap slightly and look ridiculous. I hadn’t realized I was going to have to discard all my shutters and change the look of my house. Oh well. It will be a new, more modern look, right?

And for the next 4-6 weeks, the upper windows will look different from the first floor windows till I get the new ones. Plus, I will need to find new crown moldings for the first floor windows because the new windows will be wider, and the existing crown moldings won’t fit. Ugh.

The Next Phase

My salesman was supposed to call me back to let me know what was going to happen next to order the additional 4 windows I had been expecting. Jim, the guy who “stopped by”, told me the salesman was going to bring me a new contract to sign on Thursday. I never heard back from the salesman. In fact, I never heard from anyone. Wouldn’t you think that someone from the office, either the salesman or the “project manager”, would call to see how things went with the install, especially since I wasn’t happy that I was missing 4 windows? Well, no one called.

I called the salesman by 11am since I hadn’t heard from him. No return call. I try calling Jim at the mobile number he gave me. He didn’t answer and his mailbox was full. I texted him. He did call me back. He told me he thought I could work with my salesman to place the order by phone. OK, good. Then my call got dropped. I called him back but couldn’t get through.

Since I didn’t know what Jim had to do with my job, I called the office. Spoke to the woman I had talked to on Tuesday morning who didn’t remember me. She told me that my salesman wasn’t working this afternoon, but she would call or text him. She also said I couldn’t do the deal on the phone, but he had to come to my house. Oh. Basically, everything she said was different from what Jim said. I also told her I was surprised that no one called me to follow up on how the job went. She said they didn’t do that. She said they would have to hire more people to follow up. Oh.

She did follow through, however, and call my salesman. He called me 15 minutes later. Sadly, he told me that the price went up substantially since I placed my order in late August. Oh. So it looks like they are not going to make good on the original pricing.

Where Things Stand Now

My new windows are very nice. They are much better quality than the windows that came with my house. So far, at least.

If I could, I would go with another company for the rest of my windows. Although I liked the installers very much, I didn’t like the “executives”. However, every window company’s windows are different and may look different especially from the outside. So once you choose a supplier, you are more or less stuck with them.

The reason I went through this long diatribe, that I’m sure you’re not that interested in, is if you are replacing the windows on your home, take your time, do lots of research, talk to more than one company, and find out everything you can from them. Don’t make my mistakes.

Today's Author

Allison Cohen

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