Our end-of-terrace house has Baxi back boiler & gas fire (Bermuda 45/4M with GF3 Super fire) installed in 1999. I know 15 years is considered old, and that they’re inefficient, but it is serviced regularly and has never let us down. We moved out a few years ago, and the house is now let.
I booked its annual service with a guy we hadn’t used before. I wasn’t there when he attended, but the tenants said he seemed in a rush and kept telling them how old and unsafe the boiler was, and that a lot of spares were NLA. He also said that he was unable to rectify the problem with the gas fire which was becoming harder to light. He serviced it and passed it as safe, but wrote "recommend upgrading for efficiency and safety" on the invoice. I settled the £85 bill in cash straight away.
A day or two later the tenants phoned me in a panic to say that the boiler had gone BANG with a big flash and smell of burning plastic, so they’d called back the engineer. I was shocked and disappointed, as the boiler had been trouble-free until this point. He attended straight away and disconnected it as immediately dangerous. His report said “Uncontrolled ignition when burner fires. I checked all test points, gas fire connections and completed a soundness test, all OK. Gas leak possibly on control knob”. This time, the tenants said he seemed agitated. This cost a further £65 which again, I paid immediately. I phoned him the next morning to discuss replacing the gas valve which he’d told the tenants was at fault, but he said the boiler was old and he wouldn’t be able to repair it because he was too busy.
I had a glance at it and was disappointed to find that he’d not put back any screws and had just chucked them everywhere, that the boiler was still covered with a thick blanket of fluff, and that Christmas cards and toys that had dropped into the space between the fire and the boiler had not been retrieved. And that burning smell the tenants had mentioned? It was the plastic base of a Hayes smoke pellet that he’d carelessly left on the HE top baffle!
I booked its annual service with a guy we hadn’t used before. I wasn’t there when he attended, but the tenants said he seemed in a rush and kept telling them how old and unsafe the boiler was, and that a lot of spares were NLA. He also said that he was unable to rectify the problem with the gas fire which was becoming harder to light. He serviced it and passed it as safe, but wrote "recommend upgrading for efficiency and safety" on the invoice. I settled the £85 bill in cash straight away.
A day or two later the tenants phoned me in a panic to say that the boiler had gone BANG with a big flash and smell of burning plastic, so they’d called back the engineer. I was shocked and disappointed, as the boiler had been trouble-free until this point. He attended straight away and disconnected it as immediately dangerous. His report said “Uncontrolled ignition when burner fires. I checked all test points, gas fire connections and completed a soundness test, all OK. Gas leak possibly on control knob”. This time, the tenants said he seemed agitated. This cost a further £65 which again, I paid immediately. I phoned him the next morning to discuss replacing the gas valve which he’d told the tenants was at fault, but he said the boiler was old and he wouldn’t be able to repair it because he was too busy.
I had a glance at it and was disappointed to find that he’d not put back any screws and had just chucked them everywhere, that the boiler was still covered with a thick blanket of fluff, and that Christmas cards and toys that had dropped into the space between the fire and the boiler had not been retrieved. And that burning smell the tenants had mentioned? It was the plastic base of a Hayes smoke pellet that he’d carelessly left on the HE top baffle!
