Cliffordlewis 

A catalogue of errors... Caveat Emptor!!!
Continual delays for an order placed and paid for early July, 2014. At the time we were promised a 4-5 week lead time... We have been given every excuse in the book for why the job still isn't finished now (mid-December). When parts of the order were finally delivered, all the wrong handles and hinges were provided, elements were lost or forgotten and the workmanship was shoddy at best (big gaps between French doors where the wind whistles in / Doors and windows not closing tightly / disregard for matching locks / forgotten cills / forgotten glass, the list goes on). They charged almost £500 to do a site survey and the engineer attended with the wrong drawings. On top of all that, they wanted payment in full before any deliveries were made.
The entire engagement has been utterly frustrating and the project came to a standstill as we couldn't get on with any finishes until the windows and doors were installed... in the mean time, we ended up losing our time slot with our builders because of the 4-5 month time over-run, so our house is now remaining a building site into the new year.
Many words come to mind to describe the catalogue of errors, false promises and lack of professionalism... Shocking is all I will say here.

After trying to figure out again how I can repair the French doors, whose hinges have ripped the screws out of the frames (previously had to remove and reset the glass because it was not 'heel & toed' when initially fit), I find that since these guys previously went bust before providing me with a Fensa Certificate, I cannot get compensation to replace the faulty doors. They walked off the job before it was finished and never made good on any of the faulty works including, missing glass from windows, huge gaps around frames with no covering trims (I mean huge... in some places 65mm) and is some places no insulating foam around frames, no removal of any of the plastic protective film, installation of all glass using wrong weather sealing rubber that All had to be replaced (confirmed by Smart Systems aluminium, the supplier of the system) and a 10mm gap at the top of the french doors which now I find is caused by the use of the wrong type of screws (which have ripped out of the frame extrusions). Trading Standards can't do anything because they've gone bust and reopened under a different name! ---> And to add insult to injury... They have even used the same website as before, only changed the name on it.

It's shameful that these types of rogue traders should be able to just change names and carry on trading in the same industry as if nothing happened.

If you do use (or have used) them, you should be sure you get your Fensa certificate before they leave your job. In our case, we were left high and dry and it will have cost us several thousand pounds and years worth of aggravation before it's all made good.

Following is the transcript of my previous review under their prior trading name - Published 14 February 2015:

The worst experience of all my years in the building trades.
A catalogue of errors... Caveat Emptor!!!
Continual delays for an order placed and paid for early July, 2014. At the time we were promised a 4-5 week lead time... We have been given every excuse in the book for why the job still isn't finished now (mid-December). When parts of the order were finally delivered, all the wrong handles and hinges were provided, elements were lost or forgotten and the workmanship was shoddy at best (big gaps between French doors where the wind whistles in / Doors and windows not closing tightly / disregard for matching locks / forgotten cills / forgotten glass, the list goes on). They charged almost £500 to do a site survey and the engineer attended with the wrong drawings. On top of all that, they wanted payment in full before any deliveries were made.
The entire engagement has been utterly frustrating and the project came to a standstill as we couldn't get on with any finishes until the windows and doors were installed... in the mean time, we ended up losing our time slot with our builders because of the 4-5 month time over-run, so our house is now remaining a building site into the new year.
Many words come to mind to describe the catalogue of errors, false promises and lack of professionalism... This sort of company is why TrustPilot was started... to warn people about! My rating is an unreserved AVOID!!!

Ive read the reviews below and was suprised as my experience has been brilliant from the start.
We orderd over £35,000 worth of bi folds and windows for a small housing development I was doing with my wife.
The materials came as scheduled and fitted to a high standard, we have minor snag works but all was completed on time.....we said we'd use them again and are doing so on our next planned project...thanks for the great job...

Their windows are good quality an their fitters helpful but there are other serious things to consider. I have been waiting for a warranty repair for many months, they will no longer answer emails or phone calls. It is a simple matter of a glazing unit leaking from new, it is clear they now have no intentions of replacing it. On original fitting three opening windows would not close, they took about three months to fix this, during this time the house was vulnerable to burglary. I would not recommend this supplier.

Unless you like a gamble do not go anywhere near this company.
We did a new build just over a year ago and used them to do all our windows and doors.
If any thing goes wrong you will not get them back to fix it. We were left with two doors which we could not lock, one door that was put in the wrong way around so the rain sill is in the inside of the house. We can see daylight through the door when it is shut. None of the sills have been sealed in so rain water can get through. We can pull the sills out with our hands. They smashed one very large window and left it there for us to dispose of.
KEEP AWAY

I will be recommending Clifford Lewis to all my friends who are having any work done. I found them all so very helpful from the start. I ordered 3 sliding doors and a full house of windows, they did all the technical drawings for my architect and all the setting out on site to make sure my doors were flush Inside and out, they look like something out of Grand Designs Magazine now! They helped me to choose a RAL colour which worked well with our real stone old walls as we didn’t know which colour to go for. I am pleased with everything from start to finish and our home looks great, we love showing It off. Couldn’t be happier

I have 15 years of property development experience and I have never had such a bad experience. Clifford Lewis were contracted to supply over 40 windows and doors for a barn conversion in 2 phases. I was told to expect 8-10 weeks lead time. In fact they broke my order down into smaller lots and took 11 months to complete the order. Not one delivery came on the day promised, not one delivery came with the items promised. I was fed lie after lie about delivery dates, what was being made and at what stage they were in the process. Phantom deliveries from them, couriers and direct deliveries from a glass company never arrived. The process for manufacture did not start until the paperwork for a unit was signed off but they did not provide the paperwork to sign off. I made a surprise visit and discovered items supposedly ready for delivery did not exist. I had to hire a van twice to collect units as the only way I could guarantee getting them to site. I was using my own fitters and was constantly re-arranging dates. Despite Clifford Lewis being responsible and paid to survey, they expected the dimensions to be signed off by me. There were numerous errors in manufacture. I was left with gaps up to 20mm in some places that had to be filled with trims as they would not remake and after waiting months for delivery, we could not afford to wait anyway. Some openings had to be rebuilt in part to fit the unit. Three doors were hinged the wrong side. Two doors were made with the wrong thresholds and they refused to remake - I had to pay another company to make them for me at great cost. One unit agreed with a flying mullion was supplied with a fixed mullion. As you can imagine there was huge impact to my site management. Many of the openings were huge and could not be boarded up so I was open to the elements and had no security. Clifford Lewis added months to the project.
As for the quality of the product, in general it was not bad but I was sent 2 headers to self-assemble on 2 units that at the last minute had been cut down to size with a hacksaw. Dimension problems I have mentioned. There were 11 doors delivered over the 11 months each with 3 keys and strangely the same key opened most of them.
I was under a huge amount of stress and could not sleep. The project was impossible to manage because of the uncertainty of what was coming and when. Every phase was a battle and once a delivery was received, the battle began on the next phase. As I write this, the memories are so bad. I wrote to the owner a week ago prior to handing all the paperwork to a solicitor to see if they wish to discuss their management of the contract, so far nothing back.

The company contract states that you need to take your existing windows out before the contracted fitters arrive. The fitters arrived several days after the agreed date due to illness. My windows have been fitted with gaps between the wall and the different panes of glass despite paying for the fitter to measure up the windows.

Love my new doors
2 sets of sliding doors, no problems with fast lead times thank goodness as we needed them in quick! took 3 weeks to get them made and installed. I would have no hesitation in recommending this company

Being a property developer it is important to find a company we can trust and rely on and we have used this company 3 times and have been very happy with the goods and its service. Goods were delivered and fitted on the timescales we provided. We will be using them again on our future projects.

We found this company in 25 beautiful homes magazine. They were very helpful and easy to work with and gave us a very one to one experience. The prices were very competitive and we felt like we were looked after by them as we had a bad experience with another aluminium company in the past. We have a very bespoke designed home and we feel the employees went above and beyond to help us. We would recommend using them again on our next project.

I have used Clifford lewis twice now and both times have been a great experience! The office staff are 100% committed to meeting my clients deadlines and when the fitters get on site they are incredibly helpful

I'll definitely be using clifford lewis again!

Stressful

We used Alitrade (trading as Clifford Lewis) for our house extension, and in the whole build process, they were the only trade who let us down. They didn't keep the appointment for the initial survey, and were late for the rescheduled survey, and that set the tone for the whole thing.
With our building schedule depending upon having achieved a watertight environment by a certain date, they dropped us a short email a couple of days before delivery advising that they had miscalculated on the powder coating and there would be a delay - no Plan B or mitigation was offered.

The office seems understaffed. Calls are often not returned. There seems to be only one team of (subcontracted) fitters as far as I can tell. They are very good, but hopelessly overstretched, working all over the country out of a van, travelling from Manchester each week. We only go to the end because of the fitter's goodwill - no thanks to the office at all.

The end product isn't bad, though we have a defective glass panel which they are not rushing to replace (and I have had enough, would rather accept scratched glass than keep bashing my head....). But if you are building, you can't have an unreliable overstretched chaotic glazing supplier. I lost count of the sleepless nights.
And note well: they don't do any finishing, so if you are retro fitting, they will regard it as no part of their job to sort out the cosmetics, and you may well be able to feel the breeze a-blowing past the plasterwork inside your frame. I was naive and didn't realise that "supply and fit" could include so little.

Alitrade may work ok for you if you have no particular timetable and a relaxed approach. I can't think how many people that would apply to. But if you need reliability, responsiveness, all round competence and timely delivery, then avoid, avoid.