Shipways Reviews 104

Rotten!
Agreed to a viewing in Brockhill Redditch with Sophie. Drove a 30 mile round trip. She didn't turn up.
AVOID THESE JOKERS AT ALL COSTS!

0 Stars for Shirley/Solihull in particular Andrea. Rude and obnoxious!

We fell in love with our dream home. A lovely personable, relatable lady Jenn (Knowle office) showed us around and communicated extremely well when we put an offer in and it was accepted in principal. Kept us up to date. Couldn’t fault the service at all. Brilliant, knowledgable and a big reason we put an offer over the asking price whilst we were stood in the house with her.

Spoke to Jenn on the Thursday. The following Monday we left messages and received a late night call from the Shirley branch to tell us basically the Knowle store no longer existed and Jenn no longer worked for Shipways. A little bit disappointing and strange.

Spoke with Sam on several occasions and was told Andrea was dealing with it and she would call back. No calls came back and if they did they were missed as they called my partner during working hours when I’d specifically called and asked them to call me.
Awful communication over the simple of things.
Constantly waiting round for calls having been told another offer was on the table and we would have an update on the Friday, no update came. No update on the Monday, no update on the Tuesday.

We found out it was SOLD STC when we looked on rightmove. Gutted, but it is what it is.

Surely just a courtesy phone call to tell us the sellers had gone with the other buyers would have been a polite thing to do.
It’s just about managing people’s expectations.

I work in customer service myself and when my partner finally called and got to speak with Andrea. (We were still waiting for a phone call on Wednesday)
There was no apology or understanding of the situation at all. If anything she tried to turn it round and blame us. She came across very rude, ignorant and couldn’t have been less interested in explaining the situation. It was quite obvious she got her sale, ticked a box and if she hadn’t heard from us again she wouldn’t have got in touch with us.

Yes we are gutted the house was sold, but there will be others.
Nothing Shipways could/would do now could incentivise us to use this estate agent.
To think we were considering putting both of our homes on the market with them. It’s a blessing in disguise.

The best bit of advice I could give to any potential buyers/sellers is use another estate agent.
Good luck and happy house hunting. :-)

The level of service at the branch is diabolical phones are never answered and staff are apparently not available all week. Logged problems with the property and took several attempts to arrange to get this fixed. Been tenant for 12 month improved the property we was renting (from fixing broken fence panels which is a health and saftey factor to repainting walls the same colour to remove marks made by previous tenant's) and still are struggling to get the deposit back. Be careful using this agency as you will have to fight to get your deposit back even though they have rented the property out straight after you vacated so clearly there was no issue with the property. It is disgusting that we now have to write a letter of complaint to the deposit holders as apparently DEA (the company used for the inventory) have no policy in place if no communication is given to them in regards to the deposit. I would not ever recommend this agency.

Many bad experiences so far with Shipways Shirley but to be fair they can only improve. The day before we was about to move into the rented property I rang the letting team to see how I am to receive keys and pay deposit. To be informed I can’t move in due to an electrical issue. Was told I can move in a week later. It’s was said that they had tried to contact me all week. Considering they have my phone number, my partners phone number and both our emails I found this to hard to believe. No missed calls logged and no emails in junk folder. So we had to sofa surfing for a week as we we’re technically homeless. I had not communication the following week even though I requested clear communication to stop this happening again. Yet again the day before I rang to see how I’m getting the keys that’s if the property was available. The times we rang we found it hard to get in touch with the letting team and left messages with the persons who answered the phone never to receive the call backs as promised. Each time we have spoken to the letting team mostly the acting manager we’ve been met with bad customer service and somewhat of a bad attitude and hostility.
This is not to mention the times we have called to be told that the entire letting department are off on annual leave so our questions cannot be answered. I find this bad practice and should never be the case.
When I get time a formal complaint will be made

Excellent service throughout the sale of my property by shipways team. All the staff members are very professional and helpful particularly Amber, she kept us updated throughout the sale of our house and was always there to answer our queries. I would say she is without any doubt a credit to the company. 5 stars for her and would definitely seek Amber’s services in future.

Worst estate agent I ever came across, don't even deserve 1 star. Very poor service. Will not update regarding property progress, even if you contact them number of times and pretend to be very busy and professional. Don't reply to e-mails either on time. Horrible experience I had. Wasted my precious time and bank mortgage offer because of them. They will hide all negative things about the property and later once you discover on survey, then will pretend to be innocent. Please don't waste your time. I don't recommend such cheaters/fraud.

The staff at shipways were extremely helpful and always polite
They answered all my queries and resolved all problems which I encountered
I am extremely grateful for all there help
Thank you 😊

Gemma was most helpful otherwise not terribly impressed. The process took quite a long time. Buyers solicitors changed halfway through the transaction.

(I used Shipways Great Barr) My home purchase completed just under a month ago, however the process I went through was incredibly frustrating and unnecessarily long due to, it seems, incompetency from both shipways and the solicitors that the seller of the house used - this was a company called Talbots Law (I am under the impression that both of these companies are under the same umbrella organisation and work together). The process for buying the property started off normally and I didn’t have concerns in the beginning. However, as time went by, I was getting fewer responses from my estate agents and had to chase them up a number of times before getting emails back from them. I addressed this in one email where I stated I was disappointed in the level of service I was receiving and when they responded, neither of them apologised or acknowledged that part of my email. I was also constantly being given mixed messages as to what stage of the purchase I was at - I was told multiple times that documents which the other side needed had been received, only to then be told all of a sudden that this was not the case. It quickly became apparent that the estate agents either didn’t have a firm grasp of what was going on, or just didn’t care about good customer service. Not once throughout my purchasing process did I feel like I was being supported or that they were doing their job to the level that they should have been. Even in situations that were not in their control (which I completely understood) they still had terrible customer service. I am so glad that the purchase is finally completed and I no longer have to deal with their incompetence.

Stay away from all shipways they don't no what there doing

We arranged valuations from 4 estate agents and eventually decided on one. While 2 of them stepped back and accepted our decision, Shipways Kidderminster failed to do so. For almost 12 months they have been relentlessly leaving messages and voicemails asking what we had decided to do with the property. On several occasions we rang their offices and said we had gone with another agent and that they should disregard us. They keep promising they will, but still harass us at a time of distress at having to sell our family home due to a bereavement. A totally unprofessional firm who won’t take no for an answer. If I could give ‘no stars’ I would. Even with the property advertised as sold they are posting material through the door. We’re all very upset and angry at the way we are being relentlessly pursued by these people.

Stay clear of Shipways Shirley, Solihull when buying/selling your home.

They don’t do their job properly then when their shortcomings are picked up on they just lie lie lie their way out of everything.
Will never use this shambles of an organisation again and would strongly recommend that no one else makes the mistake of using them that we have! Don’t take our word for it, go and look at the appalling trust pilot reviews!!! Everything from leaving our home un secure to not following up on offers. Unbelievable

Shipways Shirley don’t do their job properly then when their shortcomings are picked up on they just lie lie lie their way out of everything. Will never use this shambles of an organisation again and would strongly recommend that no one else makes the mistake of using them that we have!

Shipways Rugby
Having a communication nightmare with this office. We are on a David Wilson buy back scheme and we have 4 weeks to sell this property, and Shipways have had our property for 3 weeks, no updates, false promises, no market strategy, no viewings and even an escalation to the branch manager who advised he would send me an email to confirm my complaint failed too, received nothing. Stay away from this office they are a joke!! We have been inundated with agents in the area saying this should have been sold and rightly so too because properties in this area when taken seriously sell within 1 x week. Go to an agent that takes your property seriously and has a real strategy going to market. STAY AWAY!!

Zero stars if I could.
Sam Pillinger the branch manager at shipways in shirley is a very dodgy character . He takes cash from buyers on the side and gets their offers accepted on properties that are for sale and does not put all genuine offers forward for vendors to consider. Him and the SEQUENCE mortgage brokers lender his firm have been doing this for ages. They did it to my house sale last year and I had to change them immediately.
His firm should not be in business.

Whilst registered with another agent (getting no where) for a sale I was approached by Shipways who said the property had been on the market for a long time and was surprised it still was in the current climate. I decided to take their advice and registered with them which was a good move (excuse the Pun!). Things really started to move, the communication, marketing and reliability were very good and the team were efficient as the house sold in just over three months. From my experience I would highly recommend them.

What can I say?? Terrible doesn't begin to describe them. I have been through 8 months of hell trying to sell with this company.(KIDDERMINSTER branch).
I used them because they used to be renowned for being the best. I think they have got complacent because properties sell themselves at present.
Right from the go get I felt that they weren't interested and didn't act on my behalf. They gave me no advice whatsoever and thus I found myself in an untenable position with a corporate buyer. These people have no idea about buying in the domestic market and Shipways basically sold me down the river.
In case anyone is interested, the corporate buyer is WARWICK INVESTMENTS. If they offer to buy your property under the pretense of being a care home, do not bite , these people are a multi-million pound property investment company who can afford to pay full price. Shipways should have realised that, they are supposed to check buyers out; they are also supposed to be acting for you, not the buyer. I have had a total nightmare.
I know I am not the only person in Kidderminster to have an issue with Shipways, obviously not for the same reasons.
The worst of it was when they kept being super sweet until the property completed then showed their true colours.
These buyers did not complete on the day Shipways and the solicitor had confirmed, and then held off until 2pm upon the day they did complete. Having left two elderly ,disabled people , in a house with no furniture apart from a chair, for five extra nights, due to it being bank holiday weekend.[ this is a company that deals with social care properties]!! The Shipways representative then had the gaul to snap at me to give them the keys even before I had the keys for the other property. I just said you'll get them when you get them. I have since found out that if you are moving to an empty property, the solicitor can, for a small fee, arrange for
you to have access for the said property the week before you move in order for you to put bits in. Why does no one mention this?

All in all a dreadful experience . I used their solicitor too and what a mistake that was. This terrible company have cost me thousands more than I needed to pay. I hope they are proud of themselves.

Do NOT be fooled into Shipways Lifetime Membership fee. It costs a staggering £600 which is a once off and is sold in a “never pay anything for our services again” kind of way however as you learn when looking to renew mortgage providers when your rate is up, you still pay a £99 admin fee!! The lifetime fee is non refundable as well so it’s £600 down the drain. Very very misleading and unscrupulous. Shop around, there are other companies who are better.

Shipways Kidderminster
This review only is related to sales. (I haven’t had any dealings with letting so can’t comment)

The dealings I have had with Shipways have been very stressful and caused loss of sleep.
( In the end I discounted anything being sold by Shipways)
I had Offers not put forward, The ones that did get put in I had to wait over a week for an answers, calls weren’t returned and this was on a number of property’s not just one.
On speaking to a friend found out he had similar issues and he was also told for a fee they would make sure he got the property.🤔
I’m waiting to check the sold prices on the property’s I made an offer on as think it could be interesting.