I have recently bought some glasses frames off the internet and was wondering if I could possibly take them to Specsavers - as I am a customer there - and have standard prescription lenses put into them and I was wondering if this service - if offered - is free? Thanks :)

Have you tried calling them and asking?

No Its Not Free I Work In A Optical Store And Lenses Are Usually A Separate Charge Form The Frame

An optometrist might put in lenses to frames you brought in on your own. But they would surely charge you for the cost of the lenses and the labor involved.

You can go anywhere that sells glasses to get lenses put into your frame. You must pay for the lenses. Nothing comes free anymore. But aviod anyone that says that you must pay a "pattern fee". They are money-grubbing and they are charging you $20 to trace the demo lens that is in the frame or the inside of the frame...

I don't understand the question, but if it's of any help. I bought frames at Pearle Vision because of 1 30% discount that I could get, so it was about $85 for a frame. The shop I got my lenses would charge $150 for the same frame. (This is the simple version). Internet prices were higher.

Lenses were glass, AR coating on one side, UV coating on the other, so it's a very unusual premium lens. Getting the frames elsewhere wasn't a problem and I checked first.

I actually got 3 identical frames: one with a Trivex bi-focal + AR, another glass bifocal with UV + AR, and a third glass high bifocal (computer glasses) with UV + AR

My lenses take forever to wear out, but I scratch plastic ones and I like the glass lenses the best. I can use other frames and get a really good lifetime out of the lenses.

Lasik is worrisome, because I was told I'd need glasses for close work. I've got a medical condition which is under good contol, but it can be a contradiction for Lasik surgery.

I would consider a pair of iZon lenses which is basically Lasik quality vision in a standard lens. Nearest location is about 50 miles away.

Some vision shops will replace screws, adjust frames and take a lens from one identical frame and place in another frame for free.

My experience was, the internet places will not make lenses for your frame.

The script you get from your doctor is not enough to make a lens. There are some measurements that an optometrist preforms namely Pupil Distance and Bi-focal height. Bi-focal height is dependent on frame selected. You can have a Left PD and a Right PD.
My PD measurements that I did with a camera and some imaging software were right on.

N0help4u--They can fabricate a pattern from the frame, it doesn't matter if the frame is discountinued. That's just an excuse. I've worked in Optical for five years, two of those spent as a lab tech. I've done this thousands of times. Even on discontinued frames..

I'm not sure who "educated" you but they need to go back to school.

I could not get GLASS lenses anywhere. I even had some opticians whao were in the biz for 30+ years tell me that glass has inherent UV protection. Their reasoning - Why don't you get sun burnt in the car?

Now make some some comments after reading the iZon story: iZon - iZon High-Definition Glasses

PD is relatively easy to measure. First tape a mm ruler to your forehead. It's just for calibration. It can be on an angle, but should be parallel to your pupils.

You converge your pupils straight ahead looking at a far object to get far PD and take a photo. You so the same looking at a near object at the normal near distance which I forget what it is.

Now the fun part. Take a piece of free software (Scion Image) that allows you to measure distances on a photo. Calibrate the software using the scale that's in your picture and measure. You can get them all. I got the same results as the optician using the pupilometer.

I sell glass lenses on a daily basis. They are not hard to find, just not recommended because of their weight.

That's really too complicated of a procedure to measure a PD, and I would never fill a prescription unless I, or another certified Optician had taken the PD. I trust my pupillometer. And I don't care what that article says, in fact I didn't read it, I asked my boss, who is an Ophthalmologist and confirmed my answer, so that's all I need.

FMS:

It turns out that some of the places that sell glasses over the internet ask for you or an optician to provide PD. They said have someone else use a ruler. I visited my optician today and he said, we used to use a ruler. I'm not disputing that the pupilometer as being the best instrument. It's just that with a calibrated camera and knowing the magnification of the lenses, just about any distance can be measured. I use calibrated camers at work to resolve less than 100 microns (um) easily. If you read it, you might have learned something, applicable for other applications.

You can use a compass to draw a circle or a piece of string to draw a circle or a template to draw a circle or even a lathe to draw a circle. A string and a tack will work for a 40' circle. For a 6 inch circle, you can use all the methods with a protractor being the easiest. The lathe, being the most complex.

You can also drive a nail with a rock.

I see you didn't read about the iZon lenes either. The short version is that they sandwich a layer of plastic between conventional lenses. The abberations were previously mapped with apparently the same one that does Lasik. The corrections for the abberations are transferred to the deformable plastic by means of a laser, thus the corrections are much better.

I trust my pupillometer. And it's far beyond the times where we need to use rulers to measure PD. Your lenses could turn out badly if the correct PD isn't used. I know what iZon lenses are, I didn't read the article because I don't think that it matters. I have my education, and I know that comparing two completely different optical products is really bad business just to try to make a point. I don't care to argue my point with you anymore. You can not believe me or you can. I don't care. I know how to do my job.