Gas Central Heating Boiler fault. Lucky house is not on fire.

[Jonm]

Just an update on progress. Lots of complaining to the insurance company and pointing out that guessing what part is required then waiting for it in the hope it will fix the problem is not the way forward. They say that “if this part doesn’t work or fix it then the engineer would identify the next issue and take the appropriate action”. That to me is plausible soundIng nonsense.

Anyway, they eventually saw sense and today they sent another engineer out who stripped down the heat exchanger and found a faulty gasket and consequential damage to the igniter wiring. The “top plate” is fine. He also isolated the boiler from the gas supply and turned on the gas so they now have a cooker and gas fire. So they are where they should have been one week ago. Parts are about £60. As Spectric said, it was apparently easy to take out.

The idea of having this type of emergency insurance is to make things easier if things go wrong. In this case it has been the exact opposite. Remember the Commercial Union Insurance advert “We will not turn a crisis in to a drama“. Well so far this is a two act drama with a one week interval and it is still being written.

Here is a picture of the damage

 

[Adam W.]

The attached video is my daughters/son in laws gas boiler. It is a Worcester green star, fully serviced. The interesting bit is towards the end of the video. It is well worth watching, only 26 seconds.

It's one of the reasons I moved our gas boiler out of the house and into my now centrally heated workshop......Honest.

 

[Jonm]

It's one of the reasons I moved our gas boiler out of the house and into my now centrally heated workshop......Honest.

I hope it is not one of those 98% efficient boilers.

 

[Jameshow]

Just an update on progress. Lots of complaining to the insurance company and pointing out that guessing what part is required then waiting for it in the hope it will fix the problem is not the way forward. They say that “if this part doesn’t work or fix it then the engineer would identify the next issue and take the appropriate action”. That to me is plausible soundIng nonsense.

Anyway, they eventually saw sense and today they sent another engineer out who stripped down the heat exchanger and found a faulty gasket and consequential damage to the igniter wiring. The “top plate” is fine. He also isolated the boiler from the gas supply and turned on the gas so they now have a cooker and gas fire. So they are where they should have been one week ago. Parts are about £60. As Spectric said, it was apparently easy to take out.

The idea of having this type of emergency insurance is to make things easier if things go wrong. In this case it has been the exact opposite. Remember the Commercial Union Insurance advert “We will not turn a crisis in to a drama“. Well so far this is a two act drama with a one week interval and it is still being written.

Here is a picture of the damage
View attachment 127422

We had the same drama with our washing machine....

Two months of failed engineer visits they decided to replace it!!

 

[Craig22]

We don't have appliance insurance. Our local company - Churches of Steventon - Home Page - F.Church have always come through for us. For example a frozen pipe with a catastrophic leak, fortunately outside in the porch, less than 20 minutes they were there. Last call out three months ago was the central heating and hot water controller, Honeywell unit - was playing up. Guy arrives two hours later, says "I've got one of those in the van". Fits it, confirmed working. Charged £120 including the part (which I later checked was £70 from Screwfix). We pay instantly on receipt of the invoice.

I can't speak highly enough of this small outfit. We're lucky to have them a mile away from where we live.

 

[Jonm]

Thought I should update on what happened.

To summarise:
First plumber did not identify fault but made it safe by arranged for BG to turn off the gas supply. Then he ordered £500 worth of parts.

One week later, after much complaining and confusion, second plumber arrived, identified the fault, isolated the boiler, turned gas supply back on so they had a cooker and gas fire. Boiler needed new gasket and some wiring, about £60, parts were ordered.

Then total confusion, plumber coming to repair, which one? coming Saturday, confirmed coming Saturday, not coming Saturday (wrong part ordered/sent) etc.

In the end it was repaired two weeks or so after the initial call out by the second plumber. The frustrating thing was the lack of control and number of parties involved, insurance company, another company, gas engineer 1, gas engineer 2, gas board, Worcester. Recipe for disaster. If their normal service engineer had not been isolating it would probably have taken one or two working days to get the part and get it fixed.

My son in law is now chasing the insurance company for compensation for purchase of electric heaters, additional cost of electric heating over gas, time wasted, inconvenience etc. They have made an offer but not enough.

Apparently this “emergency cover” came with the house insurance as standard, very little reduction for not having it. The whole problem was created by the initial plumber not isolating the boiler, not identifying the parts required and just arranging for the gas supply to be turned off at the meter.