Thoughts on British gas services

canny_yorkshireman_2

good idea caus if everyone did this then BG profits would suffer a big dip and perhaps profiteering from its customers and failing to deliver is a good enough reason for me.

CostCutter

Beancounter wrote:

Despite reading this thread I have just signed up to Homecare 200. In previous houses we have had cover from BG and never had any problem with them. We looked at similar contracts but couldn't find 1 that gave better cover than BG. It is a little more expensive but looking at for example n-power......no call centre staff after 5pm on a Saturday! Long cold weekend if yout Ch breaks down Saturday night!

It will still be a long cold weekend!!
Our boiler has packed up this morning, no hot water or central heating and BG can't send anyone to look at it untill TUESDAY afternoon! :mad:

I am so angry :mad: I have paid an absolute forture to BG (£39.04 a month) for years and the bolier which was fitted by them, is less than 3yrs old!
I have a 2yr old son and we have had to go & buy some portable heaters from Argos to heat the house a bit, as soon as it is fixed I will cancel the agreement.

mike_the_bike_2

Thats after they've told you ..you need a new boiler no doubt

...seriously I hope you get your house warm again soon...Suggest when you are back to normal and have time to see if you can find a reputable local company to look after your boiler for future emergancies...

BG boiler maintenanance has been discussed to death on this board and there are those who think they are brilliant and those who think they re a bunch of cowboys leeching of pensioners who still think they are dealing with the "gas board"...Afraid I fall into the latter category..

tomstickland

Monthly "insurance" schemes are generally going to be poor value for money. The only advantage is lack of suprise element. If you are in credit etc then I'd not bother myself. The sell it based on fear ....."just think what would happen if your heating failed on chrismas day" and all that crap. Well, you'd put more clothes on and survive. Maybe set light to some old furniture, but you'd not die.

Cardew

tomstickland wrote:

Monthly "insurance" schemes are generally going to be poor value for money. The only advantage is lack of suprise element. If you are in credit etc then I'd not bother myself. The sell it based on fear ....."just think what would happen if your heating failed on chrismas day" and all that crap. Well, you'd put more clothes on and survive. Maybe set light to some old furniture, but you'd not die.

All 'Insurance' schemes - life insurance, medical insurance etc - are "poor value for money" if you define that as getting a return on your premiums. If everyone got out, more than we put in, the 'insurance' companies would quickly go bust.

I fall into the 'pro' BG camp. Although I don't consider it brilliant cover, on balance it is worth it to me.

If I could find a Corgi fitter in my area who I had confidence would not rip me off, I might consider cancelling the contract. However several friends have been held to ransom when they have had a problem.

If the BG scheme was lucrative I am pretty certain other firms would jump on the band waggon; as far as I am aware there are no cheaper or better alternatives.

[Deleted User]

Further to my earlier post about having just cancelled my contract - spookily enough my 'less than 2 year old boiler' started making a loud noise today. As my contract runs for another week I've managed to get them to come out - howerver it won;t be till Tuesday.

At least I still have heating at the moment.

People in Costcutters position should be GUARANTEED a same day attendance - either by BG - or someone else who will be paid by them.

Anyone who has 'talked up' their claim to have no heating just get that same day attendance should be billed.

jockettuk

i have a great plumber, he comes to me once a yr charges £50 for a service and if i ever need him for any other jobs he is there and never ever over quotes me in fact when he fitted my shower he gave me some money back as it didnt take as long as he thought it might.. when my pilot light wouldnt light in the summer i thought oh no but it turned out it was just needing a service and a clean and he only charged me the £50 for the service..

I know its different with radiators etc but fingers x ive never had any probs with mine, im moving to another town next yr hope to find just as good a plumber as im leaving ..

Swiss_Toni

This afternoon we had cause to call British Gas, to make use of our 3* Cover.

We have no heating and no hot water.

We have a 6 month old baby.

Forecast for tonight is -5c.

British Gas say "It is not an emergency, we can get someone to come around tomorrow".

If you have this cover for "Peace of mind", because it has a 24 hour helpline, then think again.

The helpline is there to tell you "Nah, not an emergency".


Rubbish. Utter Rubbish.


If your heating fails. How confident are you that they will come out?

withabix

Swiss_Toni, you have grounds for a compaint there.

I'd first try phoning up again. If you get a different operator, you may get a different answer.

Their response does seem unreasonable given that you have a small baby, however there may be perfectly good reasons why they cannot prioritise your call until tomorrow - the operators can see the job queues for all of their local engineers on shift - it may be that they already have as many calls as they can handle. It's not as if they can magic extra staff out of thin air.

A lot depends on where you ar ein the country I guess.

Personally speaking, at home in Carlisle, we've never had any problems with call-outs. They've sent somoene round normally within a few hours.

We have a particularly problematic type of central heating - a Boilermate system, which is very hard on the pumps particularly. We normally have at least two pumps and a circuit board every year. Good value for my £125ish annaul Homecare 200 fee.

Last week I upgraded to Homecare 400 and, bizarrely we suffered an electrical fault on Friday. As I'm in Stornoway at the moment, I couldn't nip home to Carlisle to fix the problem myself. So, we called BG and although they had a backlog of calls, they sent someone round.

Unbelievably, he came 60 miles from Ulverston, spent over two hours tracing and fixing the problem and went away. Now that's good service. He arrived at 8.30pm, omly 4 hours after we called them and left just before 11.00pm!!!

Cardew

From reading a mass of threads on this subject, it does appear to a question of where you live.

I have used them in Berkshire and the Midlands for many years and have never had a problem in getting them to come out straight away.