Clearview National April 2019 - Issue 209 | Page 22

PROUD SPONSOR OF INDUSTRY NEWS INDUSTRYNEWS Smile, you’re on TV How the new television campaign from FENSA will be making door and window installers a lot happier this Spring… » » IMAGINE A REFRIGERATOR DOOR, adorned with the ubiquitous multi-coloured magnets and Post-It reminders. The message on the first yellow, sticky square reads ‘Having your doors or windows replaced?’ in dark blue handwriting, that is peeled from the fridge and replaced by another that advises ‘Remember to look for a FENSA approved installer’. Meanwhile a cartoon window fitter (that goes by the name of Harry) comes to life on the appliance, and cheerfully strolls across the white door with a window on his shoulder. Using a bright blue ‘A’ magnet as a stepping stone, he narrowly avoids the third Post-It reminding us that FENSA approved installers ‘comply to building regs’, are ‘energy efficient’, and will be ‘registered with the local council’. Harry measures up his job, fits the window – as the sketch he works within transforms to a jolly-looking terraced house, with his van parked outside and a little girl and her dog waving from the living room window – seconds later the homeowner’s FENSA certificate arrives through the letterbox as promised. A final shot cuts back to the fridge door, now with a FENSA APPROVED label on it and a final memo of ‘Remember to ask for a FENSA certificate’… Door and window fitters will be very familiar with FENSA, but for many homeowners, the certificate they receive after an installation won’t really mean a lot to them. Or, even worse, they are so unintentionally ignorant to the importance of a FENSA certificate when they get their doors or windows replaced, that they won’t even realise they should get one. For this reason, the decision by FENSA to create a commercial for consumers is a very significant step, and one that will in turn, greatly benefit installation companies of all sizes from large national brands to small local companies. Not only this, but by highlighting the seriousness of a FENSA certificate to homeowners, the organisation is hoping to gradually raise industry standards as a whole, by virtue, and promote decent installers, over the minority of ‘white van man’ outfits that undercut reputable businesses, but by providing shoddy 22 » A PR 2019 » CL EARVI E W- UK . C O M Anda Gregory Managing Director, FENSA Chris Beedel Director of Membership, FENSA work, ruin the hard-earned reputation of the majority. Anda Gregory, Managing Director at FENSA explains: “FENSA is 17 this year, and has progressed a great deal since 2002. It is the biggest and best known Competent Person Scheme in the UK, with over 6,200 approved installers (30% of which have been part of FENSA since the very beginning), with over 2.2 million windows and 350,000 doors getting certificates every year. For all of these impressive figures however, research has shown that when it comes to consumers – and homeowners in particular – there is a general air of confusion about what FENSA is, what power we have as an organisation, and most importantly the requirement of a FENSA certificate for their doors and windows.” In short, homeowners require a FENSA certificate for the replacement of external windows, doors, roof windows, and roof lights to prove that the installation is compliant with building regulations, is energy efficient, and has been registered with the local council. A FENSA certificate is essential for the buyer when a house is being sold, and also shows that insurance is in place for the guarantee given from the fitter. For fenestration companies, it is quite easy for us to get our head around FENSA certification, but as with all things, when you do something so often, it is easy to forget to explain it properly to the customer. All-too-often we may assume that the customer knows as much as us about the process, and presume that it needs no further explanation. In reality, this may be the first time the homeowner has purchased doors or windows, either since FENSA started, or at all. Even if they have replaced doors or windows before, who can honestly remember what certification they got last time, or even where they put it, if they did get one? This lack of knowledge can lead to simple ignorance at best, but at worst, means they could be taken advantage of by fitters with less-than-noble intentions. Anda continues: “When we were conducting research last year, more than 90% of our existing approved installers rated the organisation’s performance as acceptable or higher, but only 16% rated the way we promoted our work as ‘very good’. This, coupled with the fact that only 35% of those