10 | APRIL 2019
News
Read online at www.proinstaller.co.uk
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 mul-
ti-coloured magnets and Post-It
reminders. The message on the
first yellow, sticky square reads
‘Having your doors or windows re-
placed?’ 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 cheer-
fully 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 install-
ers ‘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-look-
ing 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 unin-
tentionally ignorant to the impor-
tance of a FENSA certificate when
they get their doors or windows
replaced, that they won’t even re-
alise 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 seri-
ousness 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 reputa-
ble businesses, but by providing
shoddy work, ruin the hard-earned
reputation of the majority.
Anda Gregory, Managing Direc-
tor at FENSA explains: “FENSA is
17 this year, and has progressed a
great deal since 2002. It is the big-
gest 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 im-
pressive 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 organ-
Anda Gregory
Managing Director, FENSA
Chris Beedel
Director of Membership, FENSA
isation, and most importantly the
requirement of a FENSA certificate
for their doors and windows.”
In short, homeowners require a
FENSA certificate for the replace-
ment of external windows, doors,
roof windows, and roof lights to
prove that the installation is com-
pliant 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 as-
sume 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 certifi-
cation 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 surveyed said that they were
‘often’ or ‘always’ asked if they
were FENSA-registered, meant that
public awareness became a core
focus for our future promotional
activity.
“Our mission as an organisa-
tion is to make FENSA approved
installers the first choice for
homeowners; we can only do that
if homeowners understand what