First the TL;DR questions - opinions on 1 or all are greatly appreciated:
Q1. If someone states 'no call-out' but then spends 1.5 hours learning about your boiler and then faultfinding by following the manual, and wants to then charge a fee, what is fair?
Q2. Is it easy to remove/replace the ignition wire from the top of the condensate trap? I cannot see/feel enough of it to find out what kind of connection it is, and whether it would be easy to put a replacement on.
Q3. If I do a repair costing me £25 that was being quoted at £160+, do I (A) tell the engineer to just do repair the one item (he's charging me for the call-out anyway), (B) tell him I'll pay the callout charge (if it's the right thing to do), but I'm fixing it, or (C) politely tell him about how I found the fault in an hour and I haven't been the one poking around in boilers for 30 years.
(OK C is not the way I'd ever go, btw! This boiler wont last forever, and I wouldn't like to alienate the local services!)
Right, the full version
The boiler stopped working. To start with the hot water went, and then the heating, or so it seemed (at one point it seemed that the DHW would come on only when the CH was on).
The missus arranged for a heating engineer to come round, which he did this morning. He spent a 1.5 hours in the house. Half spent poking around, and a reasonable amount of time in front of our computer looking at the manual (we couldn't find the paper copy), and unsuccessfully calling Ravenheat.
He decided that it was most likely the Ignition board, and he would go off to get a quote.
Later he popped back around. i was home from work by then. He said he had managed to speak to Ravenheat, and they reckoned it was perhaps 3 things. I cannot remember specifically which three, but the total was around £160+vat inc fitting. Not totally unreasonable i thought, but he went on to say that this techy told him that if those 3 things weren't the culprit then it could be [insert more things that go wrong here].
Our engineer then kindly told us that we should approach Ravenheat ourselves and see if they do a fixed price repair like many other manufacturers do (apparently). This seemed OK to me. BUT... he told me that he would be charging a call-out fee which would be reimbursed if he came in to do more work
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Question 1:
His website says 'call for a free estimate or callout'. I realise he spent 1.5 hours around ours, and think its fair to give him something (he said he tightened a wire which was loose), but as most of the time was spent trying to navigate his way around the boiler (he's been in business for 30 years), it seems a bit rich - especially for what I'm about to write...
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I had a poke around the boiler myself (just happened to be at the time the engineer had popped back round to give me the news). The first thing I noticed when removing the main cover was a broken wire. A quick look in the manual showed that it was the ignition wire. I cannot say if that was broken before he came or not, but I have a suspicion he probably broken it when he was getting into the Ignition PCB box. Anyway, I stripped the wire a bit, and then poked it into a slot that meant it made contact at least. I fired it all up, but the red light came on after several seconds of the ignition ticking away.
Next I wobbled the bit of ignition able that goes into where the pilot light went. I wasn't sure if I'd done something bad, I re-fired the boiler, and now no ticking from the ignition. Oh dear. I took the inner cover off the boiler to get access to the pilot light area (I'm assuming at this point I'm not doing anything illegal). The connection to the spark plug was a bit loose, but nothing major. I decided to take the spark plug out and gently clean the tip, just in case. Anyway, I put it back in, put the cover on, fired up and hey presto, heating and water (and still heating 2 hours later!)
So, assuming I have done a bit of a bodge to get it going, I am considering buying a new spark plug (~£15) and a new cable (~£10).
If I do this myself, I'm not 100% sure about the ignition wire. It goes from the PCB onto the condensate trap, and then on to the spark plug.
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Question 2:
Is it easy to remove/replace the ignition wire from the top of the condensate trap? I cannot see/feel enough of it to find out what kind of connection it is, and whether it would be easy to put a replacement on.
------
------
Question 3:
But how do I now tell the engineer that the problem is (probably) fixed?
I'll probably have to pay a call-out fee regardless of what I do.
Do I tell him that it just works again (he knows it wont cos there was a broken wire when he left)
Do I tell him that I fixed it myself?
Do I tell him that I fixed it myself, but offer for him to actually do the repairs I want him to do?
Do I lie and tell him that I'm getting Ravenheat out to do it (don't batter his pride)?
-------
Just to be clear, I have nothing against this engineer, he seemed knowledgeable enough when I spoke to him, and was kind enough to suggest that I get Ravenheat to sort it out if it was going to work out cheaper. I wasn't totally happy about him then talking about sending me an invoice, but I'd defer to an expert opinion.
I'm in S.Wales if that helps with charges.
Many thanks for your time
Alex
(a pint goes to whoever can paraphrase this story into tweet length)
Q1. If someone states 'no call-out' but then spends 1.5 hours learning about your boiler and then faultfinding by following the manual, and wants to then charge a fee, what is fair?
Q2. Is it easy to remove/replace the ignition wire from the top of the condensate trap? I cannot see/feel enough of it to find out what kind of connection it is, and whether it would be easy to put a replacement on.
Q3. If I do a repair costing me £25 that was being quoted at £160+, do I (A) tell the engineer to just do repair the one item (he's charging me for the call-out anyway), (B) tell him I'll pay the callout charge (if it's the right thing to do), but I'm fixing it, or (C) politely tell him about how I found the fault in an hour and I haven't been the one poking around in boilers for 30 years.
(OK C is not the way I'd ever go, btw! This boiler wont last forever, and I wouldn't like to alienate the local services!)
Right, the full version
The boiler stopped working. To start with the hot water went, and then the heating, or so it seemed (at one point it seemed that the DHW would come on only when the CH was on).
The missus arranged for a heating engineer to come round, which he did this morning. He spent a 1.5 hours in the house. Half spent poking around, and a reasonable amount of time in front of our computer looking at the manual (we couldn't find the paper copy), and unsuccessfully calling Ravenheat.
He decided that it was most likely the Ignition board, and he would go off to get a quote.
Later he popped back around. i was home from work by then. He said he had managed to speak to Ravenheat, and they reckoned it was perhaps 3 things. I cannot remember specifically which three, but the total was around £160+vat inc fitting. Not totally unreasonable i thought, but he went on to say that this techy told him that if those 3 things weren't the culprit then it could be [insert more things that go wrong here].
Our engineer then kindly told us that we should approach Ravenheat ourselves and see if they do a fixed price repair like many other manufacturers do (apparently). This seemed OK to me. BUT... he told me that he would be charging a call-out fee which would be reimbursed if he came in to do more work
------
Question 1:
His website says 'call for a free estimate or callout'. I realise he spent 1.5 hours around ours, and think its fair to give him something (he said he tightened a wire which was loose), but as most of the time was spent trying to navigate his way around the boiler (he's been in business for 30 years), it seems a bit rich - especially for what I'm about to write...
------
I had a poke around the boiler myself (just happened to be at the time the engineer had popped back round to give me the news). The first thing I noticed when removing the main cover was a broken wire. A quick look in the manual showed that it was the ignition wire. I cannot say if that was broken before he came or not, but I have a suspicion he probably broken it when he was getting into the Ignition PCB box. Anyway, I stripped the wire a bit, and then poked it into a slot that meant it made contact at least. I fired it all up, but the red light came on after several seconds of the ignition ticking away.
Next I wobbled the bit of ignition able that goes into where the pilot light went. I wasn't sure if I'd done something bad, I re-fired the boiler, and now no ticking from the ignition. Oh dear. I took the inner cover off the boiler to get access to the pilot light area (I'm assuming at this point I'm not doing anything illegal). The connection to the spark plug was a bit loose, but nothing major. I decided to take the spark plug out and gently clean the tip, just in case. Anyway, I put it back in, put the cover on, fired up and hey presto, heating and water (and still heating 2 hours later!)
So, assuming I have done a bit of a bodge to get it going, I am considering buying a new spark plug (~£15) and a new cable (~£10).
If I do this myself, I'm not 100% sure about the ignition wire. It goes from the PCB onto the condensate trap, and then on to the spark plug.
------
Question 2:
Is it easy to remove/replace the ignition wire from the top of the condensate trap? I cannot see/feel enough of it to find out what kind of connection it is, and whether it would be easy to put a replacement on.
------
------
Question 3:
But how do I now tell the engineer that the problem is (probably) fixed?
I'll probably have to pay a call-out fee regardless of what I do.
Do I tell him that it just works again (he knows it wont cos there was a broken wire when he left)
Do I tell him that I fixed it myself?
Do I tell him that I fixed it myself, but offer for him to actually do the repairs I want him to do?
Do I lie and tell him that I'm getting Ravenheat out to do it (don't batter his pride)?
-------
Just to be clear, I have nothing against this engineer, he seemed knowledgeable enough when I spoke to him, and was kind enough to suggest that I get Ravenheat to sort it out if it was going to work out cheaper. I wasn't totally happy about him then talking about sending me an invoice, but I'd defer to an expert opinion.
I'm in S.Wales if that helps with charges.
Many thanks for your time
Alex
(a pint goes to whoever can paraphrase this story into tweet length)
