The Right to Sleep on It: Cancelling a Window Contract Signed at the Kitchen Table

It's a familiar scene. Two hours of tea, a laminated brochure, a tape measure doing the rounds, and a price that's only good if you sign tonight. So you sign. Then the sun comes up, the tea wears off, and you read the small print properly for the first time.

Good news: in most cases you've got a fortnight to change your mind. Here's how that actually works in practice.

The clock starts the morning after, not the moment you sign

When you agree a window contract in your own home — or anywhere that isn't the trader's business premises — it counts as an "off-premises" contract under the Consumer Contracts Regulations 2013. That gives you 14 days to cancel, no reason required, no awkward phone call to a sales manager.

The clock usually starts the day after you sign. Not the day of. So sign on a Monday evening and day 14 lands on the Monday a fortnight later.

There's a wrinkle worth knowing. If the contract is technically for goods that arrive later, the window can run from delivery instead of signature. For a supply-and-fit job that's a grey area, and firms interpret it differently. Practical advice: assume it's 14 days from the morning after you sign. Work to that deadline and you can't go wrong.

If you signed in the showroom, none of this applies. On-premises sales don't come with a statutory cooling-off period — that's the trade-off for having seen the frames in the flesh and shaken hands on the spot.

"They're made to measure, so there's no cooling-off" — the line worth pushing back on

This is the sentence that does the rounds on doorsteps. It's half true, which is what makes it awkward.

The regulations do exempt goods "made to the consumer's specifications or clearly personalised." Made-to-measure windows can fall inside that. But three things are worth holding onto.

The service half isn't exempt. A window job is a supply and installation contract. Even where the frames are genuinely bespoke, the survey, the fitting, the removal and the making-good are services — and your right to cancel those isn't automatically wiped out.

The burden sits with the trader. They have to show the exemption applies, not simply assert it. Frames that haven't been ordered, cut or glazed yet are a long way from "made."

They need your express permission to start. Where the exemption does apply, a trader can only rely on it if you agreed to work beginning inside the cancellation window, and acknowledged in writing that you'd lose the right once it did. That's normally a separate tick box or an initialled clause — not a sentence buried on page six of the terms.

If a salesperson waves the exemption at you before anything has been measured, ordered or cut, ask them to confirm it in writing along with the date production is scheduled to begin. The reply is often more revealing than the pitch.

What a properly put-together contract shows you

Before you sign, check the paperwork includes:

• Your right to cancel, stated in writing
• The model cancellation form (the regulations include a template)
• The trader's name, geographic address and phone number
• The total price, VAT included
• Any charges you'd face for cancelling

If the cancellation information is missing, incomplete or wrong, the 14-day period doesn't simply disappear — it stretches. In some cases by up to a year. Firms that "forget" the form are usually the ones most keen to police the deadline.

Before the pen comes out

A few habits worth keeping:

• Ask them to leave it with you overnight. A firm that won't is telling you something.
• Photograph every page, including the back of the order form.
• Ask, in writing, when the order goes into production and when the survey is booked.
• Check what the deposit actually is. Refundable? Under what conditions? Is it described as a "design fee" or an "administration fee"?
• Pay by credit card if the deposit is over £100. Section 75 protection can cover the whole job, not just the deposit. Debit cards often give you chargeback rights too.

How to cancel without handing over the deposit

Cancelling isn't complicated, but it needs to be in writing and it needs to be on time.

Email is fine. So is a letter. Keep a copy, keep the timestamp, and send it before midnight on day 14. A phone call to the salesperson's mobile doesn't count — it never did.

In the email, state that you're cancelling under the Consumer Contracts Regulations 2013, give the date you signed, the contract or order number and the property address. If the contract came with a model cancellation form, use it. If it didn't, a plain email does the same job.

One caveat: if you expressly asked the firm to carry out a survey inside the cancellation window — in writing, before the work happened — they may be entitled to charge for that service. They can't charge for work you didn't request, and they can't invent an "admin" fee just because you changed your mind.

Once you cancel, the refund is due within 14 days. That includes the deposit.

If they push back

Most firms do the right thing. For the ones that don't, there's a well-worn route:

1. A firm letter quoting the regulations and the date of your cancellation.
2. Citizens Advice, who can refer you on to Trading Standards.
3. Your card provider, if you paid by credit or debit card.
4. The firm's trade body, if they belong to one — FENSA, Which? Trusted Traders, the Double Glazing Network and so on.

Keep everything in writing. Screenshots, emails, a note of the time of any phone call. A paper trail is dull and it wins.

The short version

Signing at the kitchen table doesn't sign away your rights. You get a fortnight in most cases, the "bespoke" exemption is narrower than it's often made out to be, and a cancellation email sent before midnight on day 14 is a perfectly respectable way to change your mind.

Sleep on it. Then read it again.