Spectacles claim

You can claim it all.

What you'll get back, though, is down to your company.

Why where they £560, out of interest? My last few pairs of glasses where £12 :-)

Interesting, if the OP has ordered lots of fancy coatings and flashy frames I wouldn't be surprised if the company bounced the claim on the basis that (say) reactive finishes and designer frames were not needed to do your job. Could they say "this is how much your prescription would have cost at Specsavers - we'll give you that". There was a case some years back of a HMRC (as is now) auditor refusing a sole-trader his claim for specs as he wore them outside of work, too. I think they settled on a 50:50 claim.

I know my work will pay to a maximum of £25 for an eye test, and £100 for glasses. If I want to spend more, I`m spending my own money.

yes, a pair of those cheap goggles help mess my sight up too...

560 = Titanium frame, non reflective coatings, eye test, 2 years warranty on mechanical failure, 2 year scratch protection on the glass and as I said, I decided to treat myself.

As for the Specsavers post, their glasses are very poor quality...have you ever looked close at their manufacture. They really are crap.

so it looks like 50/50 might be my best result, well that's OK with me.

They are just as good, if not better than, the glasses I`ve bought from the hig street.

2 year warranty on mechanical failure? What about the sale of goods act requiring items to be of appropriate quality? A £500 pair of glasses would be expected to last for more than 2 years, so no need to pay for this cover. Are they particularly strong or strange lenses, I really can`t see how it is possible to pay that much for glasses without going for a "designer" label.

Don`t use them myself, but I`d avoid boots like the plague. They gave me contact lenses that changed the shape of my eye and hurt, and then denied there was a problem. Two other opticians where very certain there was a problem, and as soon as I got rid of the lenses things got better.

I could see you having problems even getting 50:50 on glasses that are so expensive. Yes you decided to treat yourself, but realistically the glasses are doing the same job as a £100 pair.

Yup, just keep one eye closed while working :-)

Since perfect eyesight is only 20/20 it sounds pretty good to me too.

Sounds like you also had in mind being able to claim back the cost...

The lenses or the frames? The lenses need to be to spec. If you had a problem before, perhaps your prescription wasn't quite right, or the glasses you got were the wrong spec.

The frames are irrelevant, so along as they hold the lenses roughly parallel to your face and the right distance apart...

"The frames are irrelevant" - when they fall apart and the lenses slip out . . .

i agree with "the old man" - quality is worth it - good for him

I did not want to get into a bun fight on why I paid that much for glasses. I have always been a believer of the phrase 'you get what you pay for' and that has held up with me. 7 years ago I went for the Boots offer Buy One get One Free. After a 3 week wait, the glasses arrived with one set were already broken. I returned them immediately and waited 8 weeks for their replacement but they never came. I retuned the other set and got my money back. Best part of 2 months wasted. Needless to say these new ones are not coming from Boots or any other cheap (SpecSavers) shop. So as I previously stated I treated myself to an expensive pair from a professional supplier.

So I am going to apply for 35 for the eye test and 100 towards the specs. Which I think is fair.

thanks everyone for your comments.

And it probably is. But why not just ask your company what they are prepared to pay? You might be pleasantly surprised.

That doesn't happen, unless they get trodden on, or used as chest expanders by toddlers (both have happened recently). I'd rather it happened to a cheap pair, that was cheap enough to have a spare pair or to get quickly replaced.

My sight is such that I also need 3 or 4 different powers (can't use varifocals), and some dark-tinted, some not. I can't do all that at £500 a time.

And I can't imagine that the -2.25D correction I get on my £25 glasses can be that different than the -2.25D correction on a £500 pair.

He's now said he's only claiming for about a quarter of the amount, which seems much fairer

What you are paying for, in this case, is a limited edition work of art and, in particular, the brand name of the designer. The edition is limited because the price is set high enough to limit it!

Apart from tooling costs for a particular design, the cost of manufacturing even the sturdiest spectacle frame will be in single figure pounds, and may actually be well under a pound.

>

I beleive HMRC is also involved. Presented with a claim like that, they may well decide only to give tax relief on the strict cost of providing glasses for working.

As I understand it, the tax concession only applies when glasses are needed to see a VDU, but not for normal use. In many cases, that might only cover single vision, medium distance prescriptions. If you would ordinary wear varifocals, it might be difficult to justify, although upgrading form bi to tri's might be OK.

my last prescription lenses were 1.0D strength. I purchased a pair of chemists cheapo 1.0 strength pairs to leave in my car glove box, should I require close sight quickly :-), but they are totally different to the prescription lenses. I could not wear those all day at least.

Yes, I only intend trying for the 1/4 value after all 22 years service with the company should count for something don't you think.

I agree that the 'over-the-counter' spectacles you can buy anywhere might be suspect. Especially that pair from the pound shop I bought once for close-up work...

Those from proper opticians should be more reliable if they have made no mistakes (and I've had problems with various ones not necessarily Specsavers).

(And why is it only positive-power lenses are available to buy without prescription?)

I`d say that, in my experience, Boots are the worst opticians on the high street. I`ve been to most of them over the years and only Boots have managed to sell mt anything that has actively damaged my eyes. Everyone else sold me the glasses or contact lenses I wanted that where up to spec. But Boots - wouldn`t touch them ever again. Ater I complained they said I was in the wrong, despite two other opticians showing me what Boots had done wrong. Very bad service.

In message , Simon Finnigan writes

That sounds reasonable. £100 should get a perfectly adequate pair of specs focused at the correct distance for VDU/PC work, I have a pair which cost me £48 some years ago, but after I retired. I paid for them myself of course.