15 year old boiler never serviced

_bankrupted

My boiler beats you by 1 year!!

16 years and never serviced. Actually it has been now as when I returned from holiday a few weeks back the pilot light had blown out and it would not relight, so I had to get someone to look at it.

My advise leave it alone servicing is not required.

Servicing a boiler is another one of those those little cons in life. I notice that a poster below has said a boiler should be serviced every year!! On what evidence is this based?

The only thing that can happen to a boiler is that dirt accumulates over time. In 99.999999% of cases this has no effect whatsoever. In fact a bolier service is just cleaning it and doing a safety test.

Baalmaiden

My boiler is about the same age, and I do get it serviced every year. I suppose it depends how handy you are yourself, but I prefer the peace of mind that we're not being gassed. My plumber does the boiler and living room fire for about £90. He has replaced parts a couple of times, so I think it saves me forking out for a new one.
Incidentally, we are told a new condensing boiler will run cheaper, but I think I would take more than its lifetime for the savings to pay for the outlay. I'll get a new one when I have to.

ultramagnetic_commuter

_bankrupted wrote: »

Servicing a boiler is another one of those those little cons in life. I notice that a poster below has said a boiler should be serviced every year!! On what evidence is this based?

Over such a long period, the chances of it developing a fault surely increase. And when a boiler which hasn't been serviced for over a decade develops a fault, it might just kill the occupants of the house.

I do agree that every year is excessive to service a modern boiler (2 years would do) but for an old boiler I personally wouldn't take the risk with my family living in the house.

puddy

in my previous flat, i lived there 12 years, had it checked as part of the buying process via a heating bloke and then never looked at it since. it must have been years old when i moved in there so god knows how old it actually was, never considered getting it serviced.

Bogof_Babe

Mine's only a year old and I had it serviced last week, because the two year warranty would be invalidated if I hadn't.

I had it serviced by the same chap who installed it, and he said the pressure needs checking regularly as if it is incorrect it can wreck the boiler. He charged me £55, which I thought was reasonable.

homehunter

When we looked round the house we eventually purchased, we were told the boiler was about 9 years old and in the 6 years or so the vendor had been there it hadn't been serviced. Our solicitor picked up on this and requested it was serviced on our behalf. Personally if it had been refused my immediate response would be 'why'? What's wrong with it?' I always thought that regular services were a necessity, for safety. A boiler much older, hidden away behind cupboards, never serviced? would definitely put me off and make me offer a much lower offer.

I know the seller is not obligated to get it serviced but.....:o

kinglewis

A gas boiler should definately be serviced every year.. purely for safety reasons. Ask any corgi / gas safe registered gas engineer.

In terms of selling your house.. if you've never had the check done before and its loads of hassle to get it checked, I wouldn't bother.. let the buyer pick you up on it if they do atall. Some surveys pick up on it, some don't.

You don't want to draw attention to it as if its that old it needs replacing anyway really.. (for newer models which are much more energy efficient)

ray123

If the boiler is serviced, is there not the possibility that the boiler could be condemned?

morg_monster

the house we're buying has an old back boiler in the chimney breast. we were really unsure about it, mainly just because we weren't familiar at all with this type. The fact the sellers could show us the annual service docs going back the 7 years they've lived there really reassured us. I don't know what we would have done if they didn't have it serviced; definitely would have asked them to, as someone else said if they had refused we would have wondered why and maybe reduced our offer by the cost of installing a new boiler.

EliteHeat

ray123 wrote: »

If the boiler is serviced, is there not the possibility that the boiler could be condemned?

Yes, definitely but I still repair boilers 40+ years old (they are very easy to fix) without condemning them . All open flued boilers and other appliances should really be serviced annually. With more modern boilers it is less critical.