Table of Contents
Why follow this guide?
This guide is here to aid you in your stairlift buying journey, and to hopefully prevent any unnecessary difficulties along the way, including not over-spending with a rogue trader. We will cover all the points that you should look over before making your decision, and hopefully make your stairlift purchase, an educated one.
1) Straight or Curved Stairlift?
Such a simple but important thing to check before beginning contacting any companies regarding buying a stairlift.
Straight Stairlifts – The cheaper, more common option when it comes to stairlift ownership. Perfect for those straightforward staircases with no bends or extra landings. They will navigate the user from the ground floor to the first floor, and the chair will swivel at the top to allow the user to exit the stairlift safely. Plenty of options for all scenarios and users, Heavy Duty, Outdoor, Child Seats, it all can be done.
Our Straight Stairlifts start from £1399 for the revolutionary Handicare 1100 and can generally be installed from as early as Next Day.
Curved Stairlifts – A slightly dearer option in terms of cost, and often carries a lead-time of 1-3 weeks. Perfect for those more complex staircases that have bends, landings, or even obstacles. Various options are also available including Heavy Duty, Outdoor, and Child Seating.
Our Curved Stairlifts start from £3299 for the great-value Handicare 4000. Book your Free Home Survey today!
2) Weight of User
There are stairlifts available nowadays for people of all shapes, sizes, and mobility. The maximum user weight of these Stairlifts often decide or limit which models are suitable when buying your stairlift
For example:
Our Handicare 1100 Straight Stairlift has a Safe Working Load of up to 22 Stone.
Our Handicare 1000 Straight Stairlift has a market-leading Safe Working Load of up to 31.5 Stone.
Our Handicare 4000 Curved Stairlift has a Safe Working Load of up to 25 ¼ Stone.
Our Handicare Freecurve Curved Stairlift has a Safe Working Load of 19.5 Stone.
3) Price
As with any purchase, price and value for money is such an important aspect to consider. It’s also important to not let the cost quoted be the only factor you use to decide, and to look at all other factors outlined in this guide when buying a stairlift.
It is ever so important that you compare prices and ideally get in touch with more than one company for quotations. You will have a better understanding of what stair lift is right for you, and what prices to expect by doing this.
Check our “Choosing the Best Stairlift in 2025” guide for more information.
4) Stair Carpet
Often overlooked by many when buying a stair lift, are you planning on getting your stair carpet replaced in the near future? If so, it may be worth looking at getting it replaced a little sooner to prevent a headache a year or so down the line.
As much as it is very much possible to install a new carpet around a stairlift nowadays, by the far the best way to have a carpet installed is if there is no stairlift fitted to the staircase in the first place! Most reputable stairlift companies will be more than happy to hold onto a stairlift for a couple of extra days for you to get a carpet fitted if required.
What if you’ve got a Stairlift in place and want your carpet replaced I hear? Don’t worry, it’s not the end of the world. Most reputable carpet fitters can often cut around the feet of the stairlift and get new carpet installed without too much difficulty. The only thing to remember is that if you were to ever get the stairlift removed in the future, you would have holes in the carpet where the stairlift feet were located.
If a Carpet Fitter ever says that he can remove the Stairlift and reinstall it for you, please don’t under any circumstance accept the offer. Leave the removal and reinstallation to a trained professional that will reinstall the stairlift to manufacturers specification. We have had countless visits where we’ve had to reinstall a stairlift after a Carpet Fitter has done a poor job, always resulting in extra costs for the customer. If in doubt, contact us to remove, store, and reinstall your stairlift.
5) Warranty
Ensure you compare Warranty packages from one company to another, and make sure you get the warranty you deserve. Warranties would typically cover against manufacturer defects, and are there to ensure you have ultimate peace of mind for the first few years of ownership. Warranties typically vary between 1 to 3 years in the Stairlift industry, with the occasional longer warranty on certain components such as motor-gearboxes that don’t tend to fail.
Unlike most companies in this industry that only offer a 12-month warranty on their stairlifts, we at Ability Assist offer 3 years Warranty on Parts, and 12 Months Warranty on Labour on any new Handicare Stairlift.
6) The Company you Choose
The most important factor of all when buying a stairlift, who do you choose to part your money with. Check the below points to take into consideration when buying your lift.
- Local – We can’t stress enough how important having a Local Company with Local engineers is when buying your stairlift. This all contributes to the following points.
- Continuity – Make sure that the people you initially contact are the same people/company that will do the quotation, installation, servicing, and aftercare. Too many companies nowadays offload their work directly to the manufacturer to carry out and then all care of customer service goes out of the window.
- Customer Service – Make sure you find a company that won’t trouble you with any pushy-sales, that will treat you the same pre-sale as they would post-sale, and will stand by the product for years to come for aftercare.
- Aftercare – Following on from the above section on warranties, it is vitally important to choose a reputable company that would stand by their warranties and attend swiftly (same day) in most cases. Depending on the issue and whether the lift is still working or not, some companies may delay the visit by a couple of days.
- Servicing and Maintenance – Annual Servicing of your Stairlift is one of the most crucial ways in keeping your stairlift running in full working order. Where possible, choose a company that can honestly reassure you that all maintenance for years to come will be done through themselves and not a third party.
- Out of Hours Service – We cannot elaborate how important this is! At the end of the day, Stairlifts are Electro-mechanical, there’s always a chance they may break down. No one can guarantee that the lift may only break down between 9am and 5pm, and the last thing you want is to be stuck downstairs when you were planning on going to bed. So please remember to ask any potential installer about their Out of Hours structure and policy.
The above 6 points should set you up quite safely along your stairlift buying journey. As ever, any questions or even a free quotation from ourselves, please fill out the below form.
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