Pulling out of purchase week of exchange

paul1964_2

DVardysShadow wrote: »

No, it is not illegal to do your own gas work. It is just illegal to do it for other people and charge them. Similarly with DIY electrical work. As ever, what really matters is the standard to which the work has been done. There are some fine and capable DIY people out there and if your criterion for whether work is done adequately is whether it was DIY or not, I think you will find that there are at least as many bodged paid for cowboy jobs as botched DIY jobs.

What is important is the standard to which the job has been done. Whether it is DIY or not is simply a false criterion.

According to the HSE....

by law only a competent person can carry out work on gas appliances or fittings[FONT=Helvetica 45 Light,Helvetica 45 Light][FONT=Helvetica 45 Light,Helvetica 45 Light]. Do-it-yourself work on gas appliances or fittings could be dangerous and is likely to be illegal.[/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Helvetica 45 Light,Helvetica 45 Light][FONT=Helvetica 45 Light,Helvetica 45 Light]The vendor is not Gas Safe registered, so can't prove to the OP (or anyone else) that he is competent.[/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Helvetica 45 Light,Helvetica 45 Light][FONT=Helvetica 45 Light,Helvetica 45 Light]As for DIY electrics, some simple work such as "like for like" replacements is ok. Other work is notifiable and needs to be approved up front by building control and then inspected and certified by a qualified person upon completion.[/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Helvetica 45 Light,Helvetica 45 Light][FONT=Helvetica 45 Light,Helvetica 45 Light]As you say, the vendor may be a "fine and capable" DIYer and he is clearly happy to stake his life on his abilities, but he has no means of proving this to the OP. As the OP knows that the work has been undertaken by an unqualified person, he should treat it with suspicion and get it checked. If he wants to reduce/avoid your possibility of a "bodged paid for cowboy job", he just needs to check that the engineer is Gas Safe registered.[/FONT][/FONT]

hazyjo

If you think you'll find a house which has a perfect survey on it, you'll be renting for a bloody long time! You will never get a perfect survey, and there will always be future maintenance issues when owning a house. Comes with house ownership, I'm afraid, rather than renting.

I'd be interested to hear the other points the survey's thrown up and whether any are classed as 'urgent' (grade 3). I can't see how you can possibly reduce the price on the fact something may have a limited lifespan, maybe not. My parents had a boiler which only lasted about 4 years(!), the next one's going strong several years later. Home owners are not legally obliged to have their boiler serviced at all. If it's still going after all those years, I'm guessing they've done something right with the maintenance. I'd maybe get it checked after I'd bought, or paid for an inspection before buying, but I certainly wouldn't expect the sellers to. Tbh, it does sound like you've made your mind up and don't actually want the house now anyway. I hope the chain's not too long - I'd certainly not like to be in it.

Jx

dizziblonde

Only reason my mum's old boiler had to be replaced was the availability of parts aspect of it - the actual thing itself seemed to be indestructible, just could no longer get the parts required when things DID need replacing. Sometimes there's a lot to be said for older things being built to last.

DVardysShadow

paul1964 wrote: »

According to the HSE....

by law only a competent person can carry out work on gas appliances or fittings[FONT=Helvetica 45 Light,Helvetica 45 Light][FONT=Helvetica 45 Light,Helvetica 45 Light]. Do-it-yourself work on gas appliances or fittings could be dangerous and is likely to be illegal.[/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Helvetica 45 Light,Helvetica 45 Light][FONT=Helvetica 45 Light,Helvetica 45 Light]The vendor is not Gas Safe registered, so can't prove to the OP (or anyone else) that he is competent.[/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Helvetica 45 Light,Helvetica 45 Light][FONT=Helvetica 45 Light,Helvetica 45 Light]As for DIY electrics, some simple work such as "like for like" replacements is ok. Other work is notifiable and needs to be approved up front by building control and then inspected and certified by a qualified person upon completion.[/FONT][/FONT]

[FONT=Helvetica 45 Light,Helvetica 45 Light][FONT=Helvetica 45 Light,Helvetica 45 Light]As you say, the vendor may be a "fine and capable" DIYer and he is clearly happy to stake his life on his abilities, but he has no means of proving this to the OP. As the OP knows that the work has been undertaken by an unqualified person, he should treat it with suspicion and get it checked. If he wants to reduce/avoid your possibility of a "bodged paid for cowboy job", he just needs to check that the engineer is Gas Safe registered.[/FONT][/FONT]

Spot the weasel word: Do-it-yourself .... is likely to be illegal. The distinction is that if you do the work for others, you have to have paperwork to show that you are competent. If you DIY, you merely have to be competent. I read the distinction as being that if you DIY, they will look closely at your work if it goes wrong and use your bodges as evidence against you. But if something else goes wrong and there are no bodges, then there would be no evidence of incompetence.

Over on the DIY forum, someone mentioned that the number of domestic electrical fatalities has risen since the introduction of part P. Go figure.

paul1964_2

DVardysShadow wrote: »

Spot the weasel word: Do-it-yourself .... is likely to be illegal. The distinction is that if you do the work for others, you have to have paperwork to show that you are competent. If you DIY, you merely have to be competent. I read the distinction as being that if you DIY, they will look closely at your work if it goes wrong and use your bodges as evidence against you. But if something else goes wrong and there are no bodges, then there would be no evidence of incompetence.

I agree this is a bit of a grey area and it is difficult to prove that illegal work has taken place. A total novice could have a bash at something and, with a bit of luck, get things right and leave no evidence of incompetence. In my opinion, they would have still have acted illegally, but there would be no way of proving this.

Over on the DIY forum, someone mentioned that the number of domestic electrical fatalities has risen since the introduction of part P. Go figure.

I don't really get your point. If you are saying that getting trained and following safety regulations makes you more dangerous, I have to disagree.

If you are saying (as I have come across before) that the increased costs of Part P regs have encouraged more homeowners to "have a bash" themselves rather than employ a registered tradesperson, I think this would show that it is safer to get an expert in.

... anyway, getting back on topic, the important thing is that the OP can have no idea whether the vendor has undertaken illegal/unsafe work on the boiler, so would be best advised to be suspicious and get any work checked by someone who can prove their competence.

DVardysShadow

paul1964 wrote: »

I don't really get your point. If you are saying that getting trained and following safety regulations makes you more dangerous, I have to disagree.

If you are saying (as I have come across before) that the increased costs of Part P regs have encouraged more homeowners to "have a bash" themselves rather than employ a registered tradesperson, I think this would show that it is safer to get an expert in.

I'm not making that sharp a point beyond pointing out that strong regulation of trades seems to be having unintended consequences.

To an extent it is relevant to the OP's prospective boiler in that regulating the DIYer out of electrical work has not reduced fatalities. So it is far from a given that this boiler will have problems because it has been DIY 'maintained' rather than trade 'serviced'.

gbcasual

Seems to me the OP doesn't really want the house and is just looking for any remotely justifiable reason to pull out.

sonastin

DVardysShadow wrote: »

Over on the DIY forum, someone mentioned that the number of domestic electrical fatalities has risen since the introduction of part P. Go figure.

In my opinion, its the combined effect of putting up the costs of getting in someone qualified and making the "how to..." info harder to find. Not only do people feel "forced" to have a go themselves because they can't (or won't) pay what it costs to have a professional do it, but they then can't do the research they once would have done to check that they will be doing it right, because the official line on "how to..." is "get a professional".

I know plenty of industrial sparkies who won't pay for Part P but certainly ain't lacking the knowledge to do electrics safely. And gas central heating certainly isn't rocket science - although I've seen some pretty shocking corgi registered folks - I wouldn't trust 'em to do the water side safely let alone the gas! (Don't know if its just timing or gas-safe has tightened up their criteria coz that was a while ago!)

timmyt

Buyers should always survey the house but equally the services - the legislation over gas safe and corg did nothing to the buyer's traditional duty

arachne

geoffky wrote: »

let us know what happens..

Just to say a final thank you to everyone for your advice. On Monday night, we basically decided to pull out, then on Tuesday we woke up and decided we definitely wanted to proceed even without money off, then on Wednesday we weren't sure again. We sent the sellers the list of things the survey had raised, as they hadn't seen this before, and then last thing yesteday, the sellers agreed to meet us part-way with some money off the purchase, if we could exchange today. Our wonderful mortgage lenders (Ing) managed to fax our solicitors an OK to the reduced amount within 1 and a half working hours (usually takes days apparently) and we have just exchanged - PHEW!!!

Still don't know if it's the right decision but at least it's a decision and the posts really helped us to work out what was most important. 11 months after first putting our flat on the market (13 months after starting to prepare it for sale, including a FULL GAS SERVICE), the end is finally in sight :T. We will of course get the boiler checked as our first priority moving in and will then just cross our fingers it's one of these wonderful ones so many posters have mentioned that lasts forever. Thanks again to everyone - have a great Christmas