Age UK Reviews 

Spent 8 months on the waitlist for services. Received a phone call but explained it would be best to rearrange and we were currently travelling to the hospital. The reply from the person on the phone was rude, condescending and patronising. Unfortunately, this has been common theme with services for the vulnerable and elderly recently.

Today I observed an Age Concern event attended by my Dad and nine other attendees. This was held at the Wycliffe Rooms in Lutterworth involving seated exercises to Music where a teacher instructed attendees which movements to make to various songs. It was a relaxed session with refreshments in the form of tea, coffee or biscuits provided afterwards. The price is £4 for the event which lasts for about an hour and a half from 10.30am to 12am on Fridays. I would recommend that people continue to attend the sessions. After being placed on a waiting list demonstrating popularity of the events today was our first visit.

Thought these helped the older generation but disappointed with age concern. They sent a gardener to help my elderly mum last year with her garden however gardener informed my mum he was given it up . My sister has called them twice and left a message to see if they could provide another gardener for my mum . I even sent an e mail but all attempts have been ignored by Age concern

This company employs homophobic carers. I also believe that tere is a toxic environment within the organisation. I feel harried, abused and ignored. Many carers cannot understand basic English and I am made to feel marginalised and unreasonable.

UPDATE
In response to my initial review, a very helpful and professional manager from Age UK (Rose) has looked into the issue that my brother experienced. We have found that the issue appears (most likely) to have been with Age UK Cymru Dyfed, a subsidiary/associate of Age UK.

I understand that help is now being planned for my brother and for this I am very grateful indeed.

Thank you once again Rose for all your help.



My brother's wife of 54 years passed away two months ago after a long illness.

I live on the West Coast of Canada and so the amount of support that I am able to provide is limited. But I did suggest that he contact his local office of “Age UK” as their website promised exactly the type of support that someone in his situation could use.

This left my brother who is in his mid 70’s and lives outside of Carnarvon (Wales) starting to care for himself alone. While this is a daunting task at any age, it was made worse by the total disinterest shown by “Age UK”

On three occasions, my brother called “Age UK” and was promised that someone would contact him – a date & time, as well as the name of the person who would call, was provided.

No such calls were received. Not one.

When an organization fails to provide even the most basic of service that it promises then it is failing in its statuary duty.

A complaint is being made to the Charities Commission

I had two delivery drivers from Age UK, Kiln Farm Milton Keynes delivering some furniture, today. They were absolutely brilliant, so helpful and attentive, in spite of having difficulty removing the old furniture. Thank you.

Telephone Friendship Service
AGE UK advertised for volunteers in 2022 for their Telephone Friendship Service. Applying to be a volunteer included the following processes:
On line application
On line modular training and online test
Telephone Interview
2 Referees
Uploading YOTI App and supplying personal data
Despite being confirmed as passing all the criteria and being informed that I would be matched with someone, AGE UK have not contacted me (although I have contacted them). Regretfully, today I have asked my details to be deleted from their system. A great pity as I am sure this is not an isolated incident

Age UK Kendal Warehouse. This location has a male member of staff, who normally wears a bluish tweedy cap. This man clearly believes that curt instructions and curt rebuffs to polite enquiries are acceptable. Or, maybe he finds himself in a situation where this personal characteristic emerges. It is unneccessary behaviour and I advise the general public to avoid the place until Age UK replace him. I've been going to this warehouse, off and on, for thirty years.

The worst service I have ever had. Dropped off some really good clothing to recycle. The manager, tall man, had a very aggressive tone and raised nhis voice at me. His time was so aggressive. Information me so bluntly that " This was a fire exit and not to drop clothing off her," He was blunt sarcastic and outright rude. Do not ever donate to this store on Walthamstow High road with this man working here. I never will support them again. I wanted to take my donations but he quickly snatched it and turned his dismissive rude back on me.

Paul from Home-Electrics was brilliant, assured me he could do all the required work for my mum & me. Very quick to set a date & arrived on time, polite & quiet whilst working. Kept me informed on what he was doing & all carried out very efficiently and reasonably. Will definitely use him again.

After reading these negative comments can I please share that my experience this morning I visited my local age uk charity shop Location Royton precinct
Oldham looking for a special gift the two ladies went above and beyond my expectations.
More shops should have experienced and pleasant assistants who are willing to go that extra mile.

This is supposed to be a charity & receives millions in donations per year who advertise on tv about how the care and want donations for the elderly .They also have a ceo on 200k a year .
This ‘CHARITY’ would not help a vulnerable, sick , blind 92 year old man with a new boiler and referred him to a small local company / charity in the Burnley area called Depher who help the sick, vunerable & old people that our government don’t help !!!! Depher rely on donations from the public & have supported so many sick, elderly , vulnerable & also families with food , gas & electric. I would never donate to AGE U.K. as they DO NOT HELP THE AGED ! It’s disgusting . Save your donations and support more local charities if you can

The Royton branch .....well what can I say, amazing!!! I've been volunteering here for a few months now and I love it. The manager is extremely helpful, friendly and motivated always going above and beyond. It's a real pleasure to be here and gives me a warm feeling knowing I'm helping. I hope to work as part of this wonderful team for a good while as everyone is brilliant xxx

I started volunteering for these and soon they were demanding I worked full time permanently for free, when it came to me applying for my paid NHS job at the local hospital they refused to give a reference to try keep me working slave labour at AGE UK. My work was great but they just wanted to stop me from leaving them and they sabotaged my NHS job which is highly unfair of them. What a horrible company. Everyone has working rights and AGE ignore health and safety, don't do staff inductions or manual handling.. A total unethical place to work or visit he company are selfish

I was donating a lot of clothing and articles to my local charity shop age.uk but the rudeness I got back from particular staff was unbelievable when buying certain articles and returning an item which did not work properly and was quite dangerous with no apology when leaving the shop being told not to come back. Very sad indeed

Apon reading all these 100% negative reviews has made my mind up NOT to either volunteer or use any of there services especially being 70 years old.
I've currently volunteer for a befriending charity and the British Red Cross & was looking to do more.
Which thanks to all these negative experiences both in volunteering and the services they provide now won't happen which is Age UK loss.
Ps if any management reading this post?
Perhaps you may want to review the your services you are supposed to offer?

The volunteers always had transport issues so where unable to do half of what was needed. I thought being disabled was hard but working around if their staff would turn up was too much. So I gave them up. Work on reliability.

I can’t speak to their services, but I’ve been trying to volunteer with Age UK since August 2021 and it’s been so poorly organized that I’ve still not been assigned, despite numerous chases and despite jumping through their hoops (sometimes two or three times because of internal confusion and mismanagement). I don’t want to deter any volunteers, but based on my own experience, you’re likely more helpful volunteering somewhere else rather than hanging out in limbo for a year+ with Age UK.

Do not enter into agreements with these charlatans praying on vulnerable people. To change the bath in my parents house to a shower tray minimum charge is £6,000. To be clear every other aspect of the bathroom is perfectly decorated, tiled etc. So its taking the bath out, replacing with a shower tray/waste and then tile down to the floor (we have those tiles already). We are keeping the existing shower as it is beautiful, powerful and taps are already on the wall. £6,000 MINIMUM. its so disgusting that they cant operate in this way especially as so many people will fall for the brand name and/or don't have anyone else to project manage this for them. How is this allowed to happen???

This charity wastes an abundant amount of paper to fuel its pernicious and vindictive advertising campaign which encourages young men to gamble away their earnings in a cost-of-living crisis. You will find my letter, along with the junk mail you decided to send to my address, enclosed in the envelope returned to yourselves.

For public consumption, please also find my letter below:

Dear ageUK Lottery,

I find myself receiving yet another article of promotional junk mail from yourselves, wherein you attempt to sell me gambling services. As previously stated, I do not wish to receive this.
Therefore, please find the junk mail attached. Any further unwanted correspondence shall be given the same treatment, wherein you will then foot the bill (twice) for postage costs.

I do not feel it appropriate that you continue to bombard me, an 18 year old male, with your gambling advertisements. As you very well know, my demographic is very susceptible to predatory betting & gambling companies taking advantage of them for monetary gain.
Encouraging vulnerable people to gamble away their money in the midst of a cost-of-living crisis is absolutely horrific, and shows that you have absolutely no regard for the people you target.

May I remind you that, in 2021, the Amazon rainforest saw the worst deforestation levels in 15 years. This is due in large part to greedy companies cutting down the trees for paper. With the catastrophic destruction such practices are causing, it is frankly insulting that this paper is then wasted on malicious, targeted spam tirades – instead, you should be doing your part to reduce your reliance on paper, thereby protecting the planet we all live on.

I shall close in saying that, if any further junk mail reaches my door, I will be forced to take action.
You had no permission to send your spam to my address; therefore, I know I would have good legal footing should I choose to pursue my case in court.

Many Thanks,
Will Hoskings