Bahtatboy

Prices for decent ones and recommendations for opticians? Just in uk for a few days and seen some whizzo Raybans but £275 incl lenses seems a bit steep. Specsavers's £99 bogofs were nasty.

kittycat1

is this prompted by you thinking patterned waistcoats are acceptable? blaming poor eyesight isnt a good enough excuse bahtatboy x

Bahtatboy

lanarkwitch

Hubs always goes to Al Jaber Optical, always really good service and he has really weird prescriptions, they were even able to order in the contacts he needed, even though any other place we went to said they were not available here. Whatever you do, do not get the anti-glare coating on your lenses, after a while it starts to break down and your lenses look like they are covered in oil slick

Bahtatboy

Thanks--optician today recommended anti-glare especially if you use computers a lot. I don't have anti-glare at the moment and don't have any problems.

archie159

Is that the one in Abu Dhabi mall? Their website say they have 35 branches in the UAE, but I can only find one in Abu Dhabi (where you also seem to be located, I think). Thanks!

lanarkwitch

There is one in Ad mall, as well as Mushriff mall which is the branch we went to

archie159

Great, thanks - it's always good to know which particular branch you were happy with, as standards seem to vary enormously (for some chains, at least).

lanarkwitch

I know what you mean, we've had varying degrees of success here, despite there being an optician on pretty much every street here! Hubs took in a pair of his lenses (daily disposable type) but he has really funny eyes and his lenses are usually really expensive and even in the UK hard to get, the guy said he would check and see what they could do, he called us within the hour to say they could get the same prescription but a different make so come in and get your test done and we'll sort it out from there. Meanwhile hubs cashes in some ADCB touchpoints to lessen the blow, got new glasses and 3 months lenses and only had to put less than 500 AED cash to the 1500 we'd cashed in points, all very smooth going really and all ready the next day for collection

Lorna at Vicenza

Lanarkwitch is right about anti-glare/reflection coatings degenerating over time - especially in heat and if you have the habit of whipping your specs off to give them a quick polish with your shirt tail, edge of t-shirt etc. Many people do this throughout the day and end up rubbing the same spot over and over again and "rubbing out" the extra layer of film on the lens.

A simple computer solution is to turn the brightness level down on the screen.

You can wash your specs with water, mild detergent, mild liquid soap, mild shampoo etc, and dry them off on a soft cloth.

I worked for years in an Italian specs and sunglasses company and we also had a small outlet. So many people used to come in asking for the nose pads to be changed because they had gone yellow, green or orange with age, sweat and foundation. Amazing how none of them had ever thought of actually washing their specs.

Blue Cat

I have always used the place at the Greens, good service and reasonable prices.

scrubbedexpat141

I got mine in Al Jaber too, but in Dubai mall.

Got them tested (free) in two places, third happened to be Al Jaber and their test came out as an average of the previous two, picked frames, went and ate, hour later - bosh. Speccy four eyes Scamp. £190 ish (I'm not very blind but I got nice frames)

busybee2

there are a few now, ad mall, mushrif mall also use vision express used to be pearle opticians there are in baniyas and wadha etc

busybee2

used the one in ad mall al jaber and vision express in wadha and baniyas

Bahtatboy

Update: ended up buying them online in UK using the prescription from Specsavers. Basically bogof, 150 quid for a pair with Rayban frames and another, non-designer pair. Chose one pair for VDU use, one for reading. VDU ones are bloody useless, they don't come into focus till my nose if virtually on the screen--shorter focal distance than the reading ones. Have complained to the company: I won't post their name until the issue is resolved one way or another.