If you buy a stove online or from a supply only retailer and have someone else install it, if something goes wrong during installation or several months later the stove supplier is likely to blame the installer and the installer is likely to blame the stove supplier. This can become a nightmare making it impossible to get a refund from the stove supplier or the installer. The only way to resolve this very common problem could be to pay a reputable stove company to remove the existing stove and then supply & install a replacement stove.

Online stove companies and supply only retailers will never visit your property. Therefore, they will not accept responsibility if the stove they recommend is not suitable or their estimate of the cost of installation is completely unrealistic. They are also unlikely to to understand exactly which stove installation accessories will be required for your stove in compliance with Building Regulations and HETAS & OFTEC rules or how much a HETAS or OFTEC registered installer will charge you.

Stove installation and the required installation accessories can cost more than your stove. If you buy your stove online you will have to rely on an independent stove installer to fit your stove. Many independent stove installers are not very experienced, do not have real business premises, are not registered with Companies House or for VAT and can fail to maintain their public liability insurance. If your stove installer stops trading or disappears any guarantees they have provided can be worthless and it is unlikely you will be able to claim on their insurance. Most stove installation accessories are not reusable, so paying someone else to remove a faulty stove installation and then installing the stove correctly with new stove installation accessories can be very expensive.

Buying a stove online may initially appear a cheaper option, but you will also need to spend several hundred pounds buying all of installation accessories required to fit the stove and pay for a HETAS or OFTEC registered installer to install your stove.

Because online stove retailers focus on just selling stoves, to make the online option appear less expensive they can forget to explain that installation can actually cost more than your stove and your installer is very likely to need far more than just one of their "installation kits" (which normally only include a stove pipe, register plate, flue liner and rain cowl) to install a stove in compliance with your Council's Building Regulations and HETAS & OFTEC rules.

Buying a reasonable quality stove Online will cost from around £500, buying all of the installation accessories normally required to install a stove will cost around £400 and most HETAS or OFTEC registered installers' will charge around £1,000 (£500 + £400 + £1,000) = £1,900.00

We can supply a high quality stove (£700 RRP), all of the installation accessories normally required to install the stove and one of our teams of HETAS and OFTEC registered engineers will expertly install the stove for only £999 +vat = £1,198.80

We offer a selection of over 200 stoves, but if we do not stock the stove you require because we are one of the UK's largest suppliers & installers of solid fuel burning stoves we can usually supply & install any stove available in the UK for considerably less than if you bought your stove online and paid someone else to install it.

HETAS and OFTEC are the only organisations who regulate the solid fuel burning stove industry in the UK. If you buy a stove from a company that is not registered with at least one or preferably both of these organisations, if something goes wrong in the future the only way to resolve the problem could be to take expensive legal action.

You should not assume because a company who displays a HETAS or OFTEC logo or claims to be registered with the them, they are still registered. Before deciding to use a particular company to supply & install or install your stove, you should always check with HETAS and OFTEC to confirm the company is currently registered with them. You can check with HETAS by clicking here and you can check with OFTEC by clicking here.

GATFire Ltd is registered with both HETAS and OFTEC. We are also SiA (Stove industry Association) members and ICO (Information Commissioners Office) registered for data protection & GDPR.

The dramatic increases in gas and electricity prices has led to a rapid increase in the popularity of solid fuel burning stoves. To cater for this increased demand many new stove companies and stove installers have set up businesses during the last few years. Unfortunately, around 60% of new businesses close within within the first three years and over 70% close within five years. If the stove company or the installer you choose stops trading it is unlikely you will be able to claim on any warranty they have provided or on their insurance.

Therefore, before selecting a company to supply & fit or just fit your new stove you should always check the following:

Is the company registered with Companies House and how long has it been trading ? You can check this here.

Is the company registered for VAT (if a firm is not VAT registered they have a turnover of less than £90,000 a year) ? You can check this here.

Does a company have its own showrooms or does it rent a non descript unit on a short term basis ? You can check this here.

GATFire Ltd's company registration number is 07054359 we were established over 15 years ago, our VAT registration number is 158416887, we are one of the UK's largest suppliers & installers of solid fuel burning stoves and we have showrooms in Essex and Kent.

Some smaller less established stove companies save money on their overheads by not employing their own stove installation engineers. Instead they rely on freelance self employed stove installers to install the stoves they sell. Because some freelance self employed stove installers are not very well paid, they can prioritises installing stoves as quickly & easily as possible over taking the time necessary to ensure stoves operate at their peak efficiency for years to come.

If your new stove is not installed correctly although it may appear to work normally, it may not be operating at its peak efficiency. Unfortunately, this can mean your stove will never operate at its peak efficiency causing unnecessary pollution and failing to produce the reduction in heating costs a wood burning or multi fuel stove can provide.

GATFire employs its own teams of very experience installers who have ensured thousands of stoves operate at their peak efficiency. All of our stove installations are covered by a six year warranty and our five million pounds insurance.

If your stove company asks for a large deposit or stage payments, it could be because they are in financial difficulty and cannot afford to buy your stove or pay the installers before receiving your upfront payment. Over 60% of new businesses fail within three years. If a stove company goes out of business or your stove installation causes damage to your home you could have nowhere to turn. Additionally, paying a large upfront deposit can incentivise a stove company to delay or reschedule your stove installation for weeks or even months.

GATFire normally requires deposits of only £50.

If something goes horribly wrong with your stove installation in the future, if your stove company or the installers you used do not have current public liability insurance or they have not been able to afford to keep up their monthly instalments, you may have nowhere to turn.

Stove installers Public Liability costs thousands of pounds each year, so many smaller installers pay for this in monthly instalments. Therefore, before selecting a company to supply & install or just install your new stove you should always insist on seeing a copy of their insurance and then phone their insurance company to check if it is still valid.

GATFire’s public liability insurance is held with AXA, it covers up five million pounds per claim and it is paid for in a single premium every year, you can view confirmation of our insurance cover in the Insurance link at the bottom of the page or here.

Make sure your stove company provides you with a written quotation which includes a full breakdown of exactly what is included in the price and a copy of their terms & conditions of business. It is important you receive all of this information in writing before you agree to go ahead. This is because unscrupulous stove companies make sales by providing unbelievably low quotations, then adding extremely costly extras on the day of installation. If your stove company is reluctant to provide such basic written information you should seriously reconsider your choice of a of stove companies.

GATFire always provides written quotations which include a breakdown of exactly what is included in the price, a copy of its terms & conditions of business and written confirmation of the installation date.

Solid fuel stoves tend to last many, many years, people tend not to change their existing stove unless they move home and most areas have relatively few stove shops. Therefore, many consumers are un-familiar with how much a new stove should actually cost.

Some stove companies take advantage of this lack of consumer awareness to prioritise increasing the profit they make on each stove over selling more stoves at reasonable prices. This can increase the cost of a new stove by hundreds or even thousands of pounds.

Stove companies who do not advertise their prices or only advertise a few prices do so because they rely on their sales people to “design” stove installations. This can end up costing you far more than you originally intended to spend.

Stove companies who do not advertise their supplied & installed prices do so because after you have selected a particular stove they rely on a "site survey" to add the cost of the installation accessories required to install a stove and the cost of insulation. This can then end up costing you far more than you wanted to spend.

All of GATFire’s prices are fully inclusive, they include the stove of your choice, all the installation accessories normally required to install a stove and installation by one of our teams of HETAS & OFTEC registered engineers.

Reviews included in a companies website, review sites, trust sites and social media are easily manipulated by paying for false reviews and cannot always be relied upon. Stove companies who receive personal recommendations receive them because of the quality of the work they do and the price they charge.

GATFire’s combination of experience, quality of workmanship and competitive prices during the last 15 years means over 80% of our new customers come to us because a previous customer has recommended them.