Great shutters - poor delivery, poor communication and no installation instructions !
I bought the external plantation shutters from APS for a DIY install. The product seems very well engineered, elegant and robust so we are happy with the outcome but not happy with APS as a company - they were very late delivering, had poor communication and could not even provide installation instructions for their own product ! (Do NOT trust the installation videos on the website as this is not the product you will receive)
When we ordered we were told to order before the end of the week to ensure delivery by Christmas. I ordered on the Wednesday (8th November) and paid - the ordering process was thorough, detailed but simple. After a few weeks, with Christmas looming, I had to reach out to them to find out what was happening with my order - it would be late as a component was not available or some issue with the powdercoaters ... all good, sometimes things just happen, but why no contact to let me know ?
The next issue was delivery - despite the clear statements on the website and the salesperson's reassurances that they could deliver the shutters, they then said they could not deliver and could not even help with delivery or provide any preferred couriers. After a number of escalations they arranged delivery with Pack & Send which I paid for immediately.
The delivery finally occurred on February 14th, seven weeks late. The next issue was that no installation instructions were provided and the shutters were NOT in the configuration shown on the website videos where they are preloaded in the frame, ready to just pop into the opening followed by a few securing screws. The shutters were all in seperate boxes with the top and bottom rails plus a box load of components that needed to be configured. All without any instructions !!!
I contacted APS again - they told me it was "not possible" to provide instructions as they shutters are bespoke sizes. This is patent nonsense. I spent a couple of hours working through the components to figure out the install and successfully installed the first set of shutters. I am now documenting the whole process and taking photos of the second set so that they have instructions for clients in the future.
All in all it has been a very bad experience but the outcome is that we have excellent shutters. If you are patient enough to wrestle through the process to get a great product then go ahead but it is far from easy to deal with APS.
Product : 5 stars
Late production : Have not removed a star as sometimes things just go wrong - no problem. But let the customer know this !!!
Communication : Lose 1 star
Delivery : Lose 1 star
Instructions : Lose 1 star
Overall : 2 stars







