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Mr Windows' factory in Ely

When a Cardiff-based windows business went bust last month, Simon Matthews and his partner Kay Jones thought their £3,000 deposit on a brand new conservatory had disappeared with the company.

So they were a little puzzled when it appeared to be business as usual at the Mr Windows’ factory in Ely.

Simon and Kay moved in together early last year and have been busy almost gutting their house since, including buying a brand new conservatory.

Kay showed X-Ray round their new home, "[It’s] a bit of a building site at the moment. [We wanted] a nice wide [conservatory], right the way across the back of the house. Somewhere we could sit and enjoy and chill out in the evenings."

And so in June last year Simon asked Mr Windows for a quote. Salesman Mark Rabbiyar came round and they agreed a price of £15,400, with Simon handing over a £3,000 deposit.

With so much other building work going on, it was another year before Simon and Kay were ready for the work to start on the conservatory. Little did they know there was one potentially huge problem about to rear its head.

In Simon and Kay’s garden lies a manhole cover with a deep drain running below it. And it’s underneath just where the base of the conservatory was due to go.

But as Simon told X-Ray they had presumed all was well when they signed up to the contract, "They [Mr Windows] advised it was easy to move. They advised it was something they could undertake within the costing of the job they'd priced.

"All he did was he looked at the surface of the drain [and] taken a photograph of the drain."

Twelve months after handing over their deposit they were ready for work to start and so two subcontractors were sent round to Simon and Kay’s house. But when they lifted the manhole cover they went straight back to Mr Windows to tell them just what a massive job they were dealing with.

For the next two months Simon and Kay went back and forth to Mr Windows to try and find out what they were going to do. Simon told us, "We never felt we were getting a conclusive answer from them. We asked them time and time again. How are you going to move this drain? How are you going to construct it? How are you going to build it and where are you going to move it to?"

And so they asked independent surveyor Tim Davies to take a look. Tim told X-Ray he believes Mr Windows weren’t prepared for what was lying underneath that manhole cover. He said, "It is quite unusual to have such a deep drain like this in the back of a house. It's actually over seven feet deep. It's a very deep inspection chamber.

"[It would be] very difficult [to move it]. A lot of work involved with it, costly as well. Not a simple undertaking.

"I'm quite shocked that they didn't simply just lift the inspection chamber lid off, which is an easy thing to do, and look down the hole [before quoting]. They would have seen it was a deep drain."

But then disaster struck. The very day Simon and Kay received Tim’s report, a devastating letter came through the post telling them Mr Windows had gone into voluntary liquidation.

Simon told X-Ray it was dreadful, "The world just came from around you. It was absolutely dreadful. I had an awful lump in my tummy. The main thing was I had to ring Kay and tell her news, that we'd lost money. I don't even want to go down that route again".

But to add insult to injury, X-Ray’s investigations have found out that while Mr Windows was wound up voluntarily on October 13th - exactly a month before that a new company had been set up. This one had the rather similar name of Mr Windows Doors and Conservatories Ltd, was based in exactly the same place as the old one, with same phone number and the same person managing it.

Simon said it was heartbreaking for them to find out, "It just makes it even more upsetting. It makes it even more annoying that they are allowed to do this. That they're allowed to take people's money, hard-earned money, and basically go into liquidation and then set themselves up under a very, very similar name."

X-Ray has also learnt that Mr Windows (Cardiff) Ltd wound up owing more than a quarter of a million pounds - and even if all the company's assets are sold, that still leaves a shortfall of £113,000 owed to more than a dozen suppliers and other creditors.

But where does this leave Simon and Kay? X-Ray spoke to Tim Pryce-Brown a specialist from the University of Glamorgan in company law. He told us, "In setting up this second company, I believe that they've placed themselves as directors at risk of being made personally liable for the debt because I think that a court would look at it as a sham or pretence."

Legal action then seems like Simon and Kay's best hope of getting their deposit back. But that depends on a court ruling in their favour against the director of the original Mr Windows Cardiff. Simon said, "We feel that we've been robbed, we feel we've been let down in every way possible. We find it very difficult how a company like that and their representatives, with all due respect, how they can sleep at night."

X-Ray has written to Mr Windows and its owner Mohammad Rabbiyar.

They’ve issued a statement denying the experienced builders they sent to move the drain at Simon and Kay's property were unable to do the work - they say it was the couple's request to re-site the drain to a particular place in the garden, which would have required intensive work which caused the problem. They say there was no need to check the manhole cover until the work was about to start.

They add that there were various attempts at compromise but they all proved unsuccessful, and they point out that Simon and Kay's request for their deposit back was made after the cooling off period.

They also say that going into voluntary liquidation wasn't an easy decision. They decided to liquidate that company owing to financial difficulties and start up and new company, Mr Windows Doors and Conservatories Ltd so that they could honour all the contracts and keep some of their staff in work.

Mr Windows(Cardiff) Ltd and Mr Windows, Conservatories and Doors are not in any way connected to Mister Window Company, Neath.

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