A man got an electric shock from a bathroom he paid Wickes more than £7,500 for.

Mr Young from Sittingbourne has described his "seven week nightmare" after buying a new bathroom from the company.

After getting a number of different quotes to replace their bathroom, Mr Young and his 52-year-old wife ended up going with the highest one which was Wickes. This included the designing and installation of the bathroom, which was quoted at £8297.35.

He said: "The bathroom project installation was well below acceptable workmanship, they've not done what we asked – there are wonky tiles, things aren't level, and the electrics have been badly done."

He had to get an emergency electrician to rectify some of the work.

"There was a damaged wire in the lighting circuit, so because of the unchecked fault, the switch plate surface screws were registering 230 volts when an electrical meter was attached, so it gave me an electric shock when I touched it," he said.

"The shock stunned me and my heart was racing. It went right through my body. The electrician said because it was 230 volts, if a child had touched the switch then it would have killed them."

A report carried out by a second electrician flagged several problems that presented a risk of harm.

This included live conductors not being correctly terminated, made safe or removed and some were still live and could have been touched.

He did admit that some of the faults picked up in the report were existing ones in the house, but these were not picked up by the Wickes electrician before carrying out the work.

The 52-year-old said: "Right from the start I knew something wasn't right, and by the final stages, everything just looked awful.

"They've given us about a grand back, because we had to buy our own toilet system as they didn't have it in stock.

"I also had to buy tiles on top of the quote price, which were an extra £309.

"The emergency electrician said that he'd never seen anything like it.

"Wickes came back to me and said I should have paid more if I wanted the floor levelled, but that's one of the things they'd agreed to do. They did offer to change the door, for only for up to £100.

"There's been no recognition of the electric shock from Wickes. The shower has been unusable for seven weeks, luckily we have another one in the house."

Mr Young said the manager at his local Wickes store was "absolutely fantastic" and tried to help, but the issue was with head office.

"No one is answering the phones, ideally I wish they would just rectify it," he said.

"When I did get through, I got told someone high up would give me a call back but all I got was a generic email and no phone call.

"I said to them I would take the full refund, plus compensation for the electric shock, but they only offered us £500 to replace the damaged shower – which they bodged themselves in the first place."

However, he was told that unless they sent the same man who did the work in the first place, then he would have to wait until 2023 until they could get someone out to do the whole job.

"No building control application was made, no electrical certificate has been received, which we paid £95 for, we are left with a shower we can't use, a total stressful mess," he said.

"The bathroom needs ripping out and starting from scratch, and I've got my solicitor on hold.

"I have since posted our nightmare on social media, and to our horror, there are loads of customers suffering the same Wickes installation nightmares."

A spokesman said: "We are extremely sorry to learn about Mr Young’s recent experience and have fully refunded all costs paid to the Wickes installer regarding the electrical work."

However, Mr Young said that he has received no such refund from the company.

The spokesman continued: "We have arranged for our regional installation manager to visit Mr Young’s property on August 23 to fully review the installation and discuss further concerns.

"Following this visit, we will work with Mr Young to ensure that any issues are rectified as soon as possible and to discuss compensation for the damage that has been caused."