Without heat for 6 days/Swalec

di3004

Hi folks

Both myself and my autistic son have chronic illnesses, mine is Chronic Kidney Disease, we both also suffer Asthma and I also have other conditions.

We had problems with our heating and required a new fan and valve.

When my husband made contact with Swalec (shield) who we pay £16.90 a month with (it's the highest cover), and the temps have been below average cold, they put it down as urgent due to mine and son's circumstances.

Someone should have rang back by 2 hours, and it was 9 hours later 9pm in the evening (despite the fact we had rang up customer services in between as well) who just said someone will be in touch. (We gave them the benefit of the doubt as there are other urgent cases as well, especially the elderly etc).

They did manage to change the fan the day after they rang, but it was 6 days on before they arrived back with the valve. (So with that we had no heat for those stated days).(And they did say it ordered as an urgent case). My hubby had to chase them up though for to get the job completed.

Someone had mentioned to my husband that if your without heat for up to 48 hours a time, the business should compensate for the inconvenience of approx £30 for every 48 hours with no heat. I have not come across this information as yet, but if this is the case, please could you point me in the right direction? thank you.

My husband decided to call Shield swalec home services, and they did offer to refund the one month's £16.90 back to our account in 14 days as a goodwill gesture, as they did also confirm by email our account should have been handled more effectively.

I am grateful for that, but do you think that is fair, considering our circumstances and without heat for 6 days in these current cold conditions?

Many thanks in advance.

Wywth

di3004 wrote: »

Hi folks

Both myself and my autistic son have chronic illnesses, mine is Chronic Kidney Disease, we both also suffer Asthma and I also have other conditions.

We had problems with our heating and required a new fan and valve.

When my husband made contact with Swalec (shield) who we pay £16.90 a month with (it's the highest cover), and the temps have been below average cold, they put it down as urgent due to mine and son's circumstances.

Someone should have rang back by 2 hours, and it was 9 hours later 9pm in the evening (despite the fact we had rang up customer services in between as well) who just said someone will be in touch. (We gave them the benefit of the doubt as there are other urgent cases as well, especially the elderly etc).

They did manage to change the fan the day after they rang, but it was 6 days on before they arrived back with the valve. (So with that we had no heat for those stated days).(And they did say it ordered as an urgent case). My hubby had to chase them up though for to get the job completed.

Someone had mentioned to my husband that if your without heat for up to 48 hours a time, the business should compensate for the inconvenience of approx £30 for every 48 hours with no heat. I have not come across this information as yet, but if this is the case, please could you point me in the right direction? thank you.

My husband decided to call Shield swalec home services, and they did offer to refund the one month's £16.90 back to our account in 14 days as a goodwill gesture, as they did also confirm by email our account should have been handled more effectively.

I am grateful for that, but do you think that is fair, considering our circumstances and without heat for 6 days in these current cold conditions?

Many thanks in advance.

Who do you think should compensate you for your boiler going wrong?

It the parts take 6 days to obtain, then how can anyone get them any quicker?

Are you sure whoever was advising you could have been mistaking being without heating due to a failure of your boiler with being without energy due to a failure of the supply network?

di3004

Wywth wrote: »

Who do you think should compensate you for your boiler going wrong?

It the parts take 6 days to obtain, then how can anyone get them any quicker?

Are you sure whoever was advising you could have been mistaking being without heating due to a failure of your boiler with being without energy due to a failure of the supply network?

Hi there
Thank you for your feedback.

Sorry forgot to mention, we were told the other part was ordered on the same day as the fan was fitted and back for the following day. It was 6 days before the engineer came to fix that particular job.

Yes it's quite possible whoever did mention this could have been mistaken, reason for me asking here, cheers ;-)

macman

They may guarantee a call out within 24 hours (or whatever specified period), but that doesn't guaranteee that the boiler itself will be fixed on the first call out.
What do the T&C's of your contract say? It should be clear enough there.
Given your medical conditons, would it not be wise to have basic back-up electric heating (convector, oil filled rad, fan heater?) for such eventualities-less than the cost of about 2 months of your current insurance cover.

di3004

macman wrote: »

They may guarantee a call out within 24 hours (or whatever specified period), but that doesn't guaranteee that the boiler itself will be fixed on the first call out.
What do the T&C's of your contract say? It should be clear enough there.

I will double check on them - thank you. I do recall the conditions stating that call backs after ringing about the problem is 2 hours, the customer service said she put it down as urgent, will have to check on the fixing side of it though. The engineer ordered the valve whilst he was here replacing the fan and said it would be in the following day.

There are several types of Shield cover, we have the top one I do know that.

Will check them out, thanks again.

Wywth

di3004 wrote: »

Hi there
Thank you for your feedback.

Sorry forgot to mention, we were told the other part was ordered on the same day as the fan was fitted and back for the following day. It was 6 days before the engineer came to fix that particular job.

Yes it's quite possible whoever did mention this could have been mistaken, reason for me asking here, cheers ;-)

Why was the valve not ordered the same time as the fan?
Presumably what you are saying is the engineer did not realise you also needed a new valve until the replacement fan was fitted.

If you have reason to believe the valve was available to them for 5 days before it was fitted, you will need to ask the service provider why they did not arrange the Gas Safe Register engineers were not there earlier "to get things back up and running as soon as possible."
http://www.swalec.co.uk/HeatingAndWiring/GasHeatingCare/?graphics=low

di3004

Wywth wrote: »

Why was the valve not ordered the same time as the fan?
Presumably what you are saying is the engineer did not realise you also needed a new valve until the replacement fan was fitted.

If you have reason to believe the valve was available to them for 5 days before it was fitted, you will need to ask the service provider why they did not arrange the Gas Safe Register engineers were not there earlier "to get things back up and running as soon as possible."
http://www.swalec.co.uk/HeatingAndWiring/GasHeatingCare/?graphics=low

Hi there, thanks for posting up the link you beat me to it lol.

Yes they were made aware of both, my husband explained on the phone that the fan was still playing up (as they had come out 3 weeks prior to that as well) and just sprayed it and the engineer said he was to put that on order as well because that wasnt going to last either and they do tend to go.
So sprayed it as a temp measure until they replace it.

So my hubby noticed when switching on the mains that the needle on the valve was not moving, therefore no heating or hot water, he rang them to say about the fan again (as we were told that was on order a few weeks before) and explained about the problem with the valve. My husband was informed that the fan was to be ordered again (as there was no record of an order) and that will be in the following day, and the valve matter the engineer will take a look at and yet they may carry them items on the van.

So the engineer arrived the following day with the fan, changed that, then checked the valve and said he wasnt aware, and put it on order and said it should be back the next day as a matter or urgency.

Fire_Fox

Read the terms and conditions, write a letter of complaint if you think you have a case.

di3004

Fire_Fox wrote: »

Read the terms and conditions, write a letter of complaint if you think you have a case.

Thank you.

My husband emailed a few days ago and they did email back today to apologise and admitted that this matter should have been dealt with more affectively, and have addressed all contacts/tel calls and emails that they have taken into account as well. They apologised for us not getting any contact to let us know that the part was a little later to come back, as it was originally due to come back the following day.

For that they have offered a one months cover refund back into our account by 14 days.

Wywth

di3004 wrote: »

Hi there, thanks for posting up the link you beat me to it lol.

Yes they were made aware of both, my husband explained on the phone that the fan was still playing up (as they had come out 3 weeks prior to that as well) and just sprayed it and the engineer said he was to put that on order as well because that wasnt going to last either and they do tend to go.
So sprayed it as a temp measure until they replace it.

So my hubby noticed when switching on the mains that the needle on the valve was not moving, therefore no heating or hot water, he rang them to say about the fan again (as we were told that was on order a few weeks before) and explained about the problem with the valve. My husband was informed that the fan was to be ordered again (as there was no record of an order) and that will be in the following day, and the valve matter the engineer will take a look at and yet they may carry them items on the van.

So the engineer arrived the following day with the fan, changed that, then checked the valve and said he wasnt aware, and put it on order and said it should be back the next day as a matter or urgency.

Sorry, I don't follow you. It should be delivered the next day or do you have evidence that it was delivered the next day?

Also, are you saying you have been without any heat for 3 weeks due to the dodgy valve?

Or are you saying the dodgy valve had no adverse affect on the ability of the boiler to produce heat?

di3004

Wywth wrote: »

Sorry, I don't follow you. It should be delivered the next day or do you have evidence that it was delivered the next day?

Also, are you saying you have been without any heat for 3 weeks due to the dodgy valve?

Or are you saying the dodgy valve had no adverse affect on the ability of the boiler to produce heat?

No, the fan had been playing up for some time, way before they replaced it, they came out three times prior to replacing the valve, they used a spray which did get it going and the 2nd time when he sprayed it again he put one on order as he said it will not last and that because that was the 2nd time they had come out to deal with the same issue (fan).

Another day when my husband went to press the switch on for hot water and heat, the needle didnt budge, you normally hear it, but there was no life in it at all.

So he rang them to report the valve problem as well as saying that the engineer said he ordered a new fan a few weeks before, so that was then 2 issues for them to deal with.

The following day after hubby called them, they came out with the fan but no valve, so the fan was replaced and it was 6 days on they arrived to put on the new valve.