Help! Can't Get Anyone To Fix Our Alpha LPG Boiler

fallen121

Our LPG gas boiler won’t light, but I’m having a terrible time trying to get a engineer to fix it.


Alpha, the maker of our boiler, recently sent us a letter offering fixed prices for servicing and callouts @£65 which is considerably cheaper than British Gas. However, when we phoned up it transpired we were talking to “Homeserve” who advised that they “don’t cover” Alpha boilers anymore, even though the letter is only a couple of weeks old.


So we go back to Alpha, but no success getting through, just keep getting put on hold all the time.


Very reluctant to go to British Gas, terminated our Service Contract with them after they kept cancelling appointments at the last minute when we’d taken days off work to wait in, this happened 3 times. On the fourth attempt, they sent someone who wasn’t LPG qualified even though we’d made several phone calls and had it noted on the job sheet that it is an LPG boiler. Phoned British Gas to complain, spoke to a young girl who said “What’s LPG?” Du-oh!


Just want someone to come out and fix this boiler as we have no hot water or heating, but as soon as you tell people it is LPG they don’t want to know.

Not our fault we live in an area with no mains gas where we have to pay full price VAT for bottled gas. The newspapers make a lot of Rural fuel poverty but they ignore the fact that not only can’t we access Mains gas, we can’t even get anyone to fix the boiler when things go wrong.

Any suggestions as to how to get someone out who won’t run a mile when they find out it is LPG? We are also in Scotland which doesn’t exactly help.

frankie

Try to get a well regarded 'local' gas safe registered plumber to give a quote, much better than going to a rip off franchised dealer like BG etc.

We have lots of good guys here in SE Cornwall who deal in both oil and lpg boilers, need to be gas safe for lpg though.

fallen121

NO-ONE WILL CALL US BACK!!

Tried to cut down on how often we have a shower to reduce the amount of times the immersion has to be on, but still going to be costing us a FORTUNE. Washing up with the kettle. Bloody depressing.

WHY WON'T ANYONE COME OUT OR EVEN RETURN OUR PHONE CALLS?? DOESN'T ANYONE WANT TO WORK???

PaulF81

Alpha is a pretty rubbish brand. Get a valiant.

fallen121

The boiler isn't very old, so I don't think we can really justfy replacing it yet.

Plus your suggestion is all very well...but it doesn't really solve my current problem.

Am I going to be more likely to get someone to come out and repair my boiler in the future if I change my brand of boiler?

Canucklehead

O.P.: perhaps you have done so but have you tried the 'Find My Nearest Qualified Boiler Installer' search facility on the Alpha website? Cross reference on Gas Safe Register to determine those in your area who hold LPG certification.

fallen121

Wow this is really useful, lots of Plumbers and Heating engineers, many of these are not in the Yellow Pages. I expect it is too late to phone anyone now, but am beginning to feel a bit more hopeful again. :beer:

Just as an aside, two of the results were quite interesting, they included "Harbour and Marine Diving Contractors" and also a caravan park.....!