Warmfront Scheme - Have you had experience of a good contractor within S. Devon?

Tao81

Have you had a good experience with a warmfront contractor within the S. Devon area, regarding replacement of central heating boiler and radiators etc.? If so, could you please share their details? Even if it's simply the contractors company name..............Ta.:D

Elderly friend been offered the warmfront grant, she's very fragile and I certainly wouldn't want her to encounter some of the problems some people have encountered via this scheme, that I've read about online and watched on Watchdog last year, certain contractors under this scheme seem to be very shoddy workmen with no respect for the properties they work within (stress would probably kill her?!):eek:

I know there are some excellent contractors working under this scheme all around the country. Therefore, can anyone point her in the direction of a good one who works in South Devon area please?....Thanks

P.S. She's already been contacted via letter by a company called Kershaw Insulation Contracting Services Ltd, their business address is Broad Lane, Cottenham, Cambridgeshire???? asking to arrange a technical survey.....Anyone had any dealings with them? Seems a long way away to be based and working within Devon area????........At this stage she could refuse them, if necessary, and get another company assigned to do it if she knew who to request?:T

david29dpo

It my case i had no choose who the contractor was anyway.

Tao81

Thanks for the reply david29dpo. Do you live in Devon and did you choose to go through with the scheme?
If so, what was your experience and would you mind sharing with us who did the work at your property?

Warmfront have said that she can be reassigned to an approved contractor of her choice should she be unhappy with they contractor they initially link her with.

However, no-one here has ever heard of Kershaws as they are based in Cambs?!
Hence, why I put this post out. Simply looking for any feedback out there from people within S. Devon who've used the scheme and been pleased with the standard of work carried out.
She's quite happy to go ahead and have these guys in if they have a good recommend.

david29dpo

I am in the west midlands and its my parents who went with the scheme.
They had to use there fitters who were crap and over priced.

Tao81

david29dpo wrote: »

I am in the west midlands and its my parents who went with the scheme.
They had to use there fitters who were crap and over priced.

Thanks and I am very sorry to hear that!

There are simply too many people who have had a similar very negative and upsetting experiences to that of your parents. The work carried out under this scheme should definately be monitored and regulated more thoroughly.
Seems downright criminal what some of them get away with and there appears to be no accountability which is obviously what drives such poor practice by contractors who are less than scrupulous.
Don't want the fitting of a CH system to kill her, she got health problems?!!
If no responses appear here citing good contractor(s) in this area then I think the best route would be for her to pay a private firm to come in and do the work under general recommend from neighbours etc,. rather than risk it going badly wrong under this scheme!

However, I have read quite a few, seemingly genuine reports (due to type of details given etc), online by those that have had a throroughly excellent, problem free service. Trouble is, a lot of people forget or omit to mention where they live or who the contracted company was who did their work, so not much help when you are trying to decern who's who in order to safeguard someone from potential disaster?!
There was an article, I think it was in the Mail newspaper, where there was an extended amount of answers to the piece written on the scheme and although plenty of people jumped onto post bad experiences, there was a healthy smattering of good experiences too!:T So it obviously can be do properly and works really well for some?!
Within these replies, I remember reading one good review which mentioned Kershaws as a father and son team that were excellent, the OP actually stated where they lived and it was nowhere near Devon, so I can't be sure it was the same company?

The only hope is to keep checking here and pray that there are some people fortunate enough to be able to come forward and cite good standards of service delivered via professional, honest and repectful contractor(s) known to work in Devon under this warmfront scheme................ Got to be at least one out there surely?!! :rolleyes:

macman

Why don't you ring up Kershaw and ask how they can be covering Devon from Cambridgeshire? That may just be their registered address, their business may be in Devon. That way you can get a better idea of what they're like.
Most decent CH engineeers will carry out Warmfront work, you are normally given a choice of local contractors.
If she is having full CH installed from scratch then you'll need to move her out for a few days anyway, the house will not be habitable, as all the floorboards will be up and no hot water for a while.
PS: according to their website they only cover the following:
Kershaw Heating and Plumbing Services are supplied across Cambridgeshire, Bedfordshire, Essex, Norfolk, Suffolk, NE London and the Home Counties. Kershaw is an approved contractor for the government Warm Front scheme
(www.warmfront.co.uk) installing around 3000 upgraded heating systems each year.

Tao81

Yeah, had a look at their website, confused?!! Will get in touch once given this thread a decent chance to flag up a good contractor.............or not?!

Tao81

Bump!:o

There must be someone out there who has experience of warmfront in Devon.......Please reply,..........Pretty please??? :beer:

Tao81

Cheeky Weekend Bump?!

zzzLazyDaisy

I am in north west. I had no choice but to go with the appointed contractor. They charged for two days work, but cleared off after three hours to go to another job leaving the job half finished and a valve not tightened properly which caused a flood and hundreds of pounds worth of damage. They then refused to take responsibility claiming that they never touched the valve and that after they left I must have got another plumber in who must have left the valve undone.

The valve was upstairs, I am disabled and don't go upstairs, so while they were working upstairs they were unsupervised. I definitely did not have anyone else working on the system at that time though - why would I????

If you are going to have warm front contractors in the house, make sure you have someone there to supervise the workers and check you are happy with everything before they leave.

Tao81

lazydaisy ....that's shocking! Sorry to hear you had to deal with this!
Not the first time I have heard of a company under this scheme acting this way.
Under this scheme there seems to be so little accountability when things go wrong, from what I can tell?