Moben Kitchens Review

Overall Rating

None

Many

A year on we are still struggling with our Moben kitchen we had installed. The quality of the components are very good, but do make sure you get kitchen fitters from Moben and not a subcontractor. There were no quality checks from Moben and it took us to complain vigorously to get their attention eventually.

The disaster started after we had visited MFI and been very unimpressed with the laid-back and disinterested attitude of some of their sales staff. My wife wanted some plant pots so we visited Do-It-All and I filled in some time wandering around their in-store Moben showroom. The sales person was very helpful and after only a little persuasion a rep visit was organised for that very day. I was impressed with that and also with the professionalism and attitude of the rep. The price was about the same as the MFI price so we signed up.

The problems began with removal of the old units. A day had been set aside for stripping out the old. The guy was very willing but the old kitchen had been well installed and wasn't coming out easy. The plywood units in particular were hell to get out, and eventually I had to help the guy all afternoon by using a car jack and some cunning ideas to break the old stuff out. I have to say that without my help he would still be doing it, and of course the customer should just sit back and watch things happening, and not get his hands dirty. We finished the job at about 8pm and both me and the Moben guy were knackered.

The installation staff then arrived. I did not like the attitude of the guy in charge.
However, we were paid and committed. But I was having nothing of it, and the relationship soured rapidly. Here's a list:

1. Units installed so that the American fridge-freezer was about 6" proud of the front of the units.

2. Exhaust outlet for the cooker hood was so positioned that it could not come out through a wall and eventually had to be re-planned through an adjacent roof. With better planning it could have been routed via the old outlet. The cooker itself was approx 1/2" lower than the surrounding work surface as the fitter hadnt bothered to raise it. An easy job I did myself later. Just a matter of screwing the legs upwards.

3. In order to fit the cooker hood shroud, they left coving 6" short of the shroud at both ends in order to get a screwdriver in. They considered the job "done" in that state. I lost it at that point and told the fitter that I had never seen anything that incompetent. I later had my own builder complete the job and had Moben pay for the work.

5. When it came to connecting the gas to the cooker a fitter turned up and spent an afternoon telling me where the gas bottle could not go. It seemed he could only tell me what could NOT be done. He eventually suggested that the gas bottle be installed at the front of this property with a 25m run of gas line at £40 per metre" Eventually our own builder found a solution to the gas problem that didn't cost us anything extra.

6. We had committed and paid for another new kitchen in our granny flat in order to have both done at the same time. Moben had set aside a day to strip out the kitchen in the granny flat, but after my experience with the Moben stripper outer, I got my own builder to do it. A "day of work" planned for by Moben was completed in 90 minutes.

7. I wasn't going to write a review, preferring to forget the entire Moben experience, but yesterday, a year after the kitchen was "fitted" the pull out kitchen unit came loose. I have just spent an hour dismantling the unit and fitting screws with adequate-sized heads.