Boiler broken - What rights do I have as a tenant?

ctb101

rpc wrote: »

Things break.

And because of this simple fact of life, should a landlord not be prepared to get vital utilities repaired within a very short period of time? Obviously not within 24hrs but within a week at most? Bearing in mind the inconvenience (never mind the potential health implications) of not having heat or hot water in winter, how can 15 days be deemed reasonable?

thesaint

ctb101 wrote: »

how can 15 days be deemed reasonable?

One of our boilers in a tenanted property broke.
It was under warranty, and required a part to be sent from Italy.

Reasonable is subjective, so reasonable might be 24 hours, or it might mean a month.

G_M

thesaint wrote: »

One of our boilers in a tenanted property broke.
It was under warranty, and required a part to be sent from Italy.

Reasonable is subjective, so reasonable might be 24 hours, or it might mean a month.

It is precisely for this reason that the law does not specify a specific timescale. The law cannot say "A broken boiler must be fixed in X (eg 48) hours. So much depends on the fault, the availability of parts, availability of engineers, access restrictions to the property, and a host of other variables.

So the law says: 'reasonable'.

Naturally, this can be debated endlessly (as this thread demonstrates); typically a consumer's (tenant's) interpretation is either 'now' or 'nearly now' while a providers' (landlords) is 'as soon as I can' or as soon as my man can'.

And since these interpretations vary (again- see this thread!), we have courts to decide in each individual case, based on the specific circumstances, where the parties fail to agree and decide to sue each other.

As rpc says, the courts might try to second-guess the opinion of the man on the Clapham omnibus.

Frankly, if a search of other threads were undertaken, you'd find a lot worse scenarios than this one, where there was a genuine, unarguable cause for complaint.

(and no, even that does not mean LLs are all rogues, just that some LLs are rogues, just as some shop-keepers are, some police are, some tenants are etc etc

and that good landlords seldom get threads started about them on a forum like this.)

Soleil_lune

Yes maybe we don't NEED central heating (supposedly,) but we don't NEED televisions, hi-fi, cars, computers, the internet, washing machines, microwaves, and many other modern day mod cons. Yet most people HAVE them, and some of these things, people DO find hard to live without.

So maybe the central heating generation are spoilt: so shoot us! Yes, we DON'T bathe in a tin bath at the bottom of the garden, and shake ourselves dry because our mam can't afford towels! So shoot us again!

Without the heating on, pipes are at risk of freezing up, and the house gets BITTERLY cold. It IS an uncomfortable environment, and if the house is large or old or not well insulated, (or all three!) your health can deteriorate if there is very little or NO heating for a week or more in the winter. (It's particularly bad for the very young, the very old, and people with respiratory problems; especially as without heating, damp and mould will often form.)

Maybe this landlord DID do their best, but 15 days is a bit long to be without heating. However, if my boiler had broken on 2nd October, and they gave me a fixed and 'definite' date for it to be replaced, and said it would be say, 18th October; I would tolerate it, as I would KNOW when it was being done.

But my old landlady was a flaky old bint, and would be told about things needing doing, and she'd say 'leave it with me,' and 3 days later, I would ring the property agent and they would say 'she hasn't rung us back yet.' Then they would faff about waiting another day or two, and then they would email her, and it would sometimes take AGES for stuff to be fixed. Much longer than it should have. They said nothing to HER though, as the agents work for the landlords: not the tenants!

Yes, I am SURE that there are landlords out there who are fine, and care for the property OK, especially if it's a house they intend to move back into etc, but many: especially if they have a house they can't sell and they are renting out til they get rid, or if it's BTL; don't give a sh*t.

Every single person I have spoken to, who has rented privately (about 12/13 people: ) has had at least ONE awful landlord and one not so good, and one or several average. But I have yet to hear anyone say their landlord was amazing.

I would HATE to be in private let now, and feel very sorry for people who are. Having a social housing landlord now, and the speed and efficiency they display when it comes to repairs and maintenance, makes me realise what a poor landlady I had. She didn't give a damn about the property, and most of the time would cut her own wrists, before fixing something for us: even if it was causing discomfort or inconvenience for us.

SHE was a landlady who had bought a house, moved on to another before selling her house (thinking she could sell quickly,) and she was stuck with a house she didn't want, that is now in £40K negative equity, and which she cannot sell. She would regularly bleat how she could not afford repairs, but had 4 cars between 3 adults in the house, 4 or 5 holidays a year to various continents, gym and golf club memberships, and every fancy gadget under the sun. Yet she wouldn't fork out £100 to do a repair that was regularly causing a 2" deep flood outside our back door. And some people wonder why landlords and landladies get a bad rap!

G_M

Soleil_lune wrote: »

........However, if my boiler had broken on 2nd October, and they gave me a fixed and 'definite' date for it to be replaced, and said it would be say, 18th October; I would tolerate it, as I would KNOW when it was being done.

Sadly, this too is unrealistic.

Yes, a good landlord will communicate to the tenant what they are doing, but the LL is highly unlikely to know, for definite when it will be fixed.

If waiting for parts, or new boiler delivery, it will depend when the supplier sends it out, how long the post takes etc.

If the engineer finds the part does not completely fix the problem and a 2nd new part is needed, there will be a further delay.

If the engineer gets flu....

If if if

LL's can only act in a reasonable way, not in accordance with any fixed timescale, whether that timescale is set by law, or by themselves!
If

SerialRenter

"House! You were lucky to live in a house! We used to live in one room, all twenty-six of us, no furniture, 'alf the floor was missing, and we were all 'uddled together in one corner for fear of falling."

I agree putting a timescale on these sorts of things is unreasonable, but then again, how much does it cost for a landlord to communicate what the bottle neck is? Not a penny.
It's nice for the tenant to be kept in the loop, and put to rest fears that's its not just the landlord being lazy/cheap.

There's obviously a bad minority of both landlords and tenants, and I'd'd hazard to say everyone's who rented/rented has as a run in with one.

Tenants should obviously remember that they have contractual responsibilities to inform, and landlords need to remember they're running a business and breakages do occur and need budgeting for before they happen.

Kynthia

ctb101 wrote: »

And because of this simple fact of life, should a landlord not be prepared to get vital utilities repaired within a very short period of time? Obviously not within 24hrs but within a week at most? Bearing in mind the inconvenience (never mind the potential health implications) of not having heat or hot water in winter, how can 15 days be deemed reasonable?

15 days is reasonable depending on the job. No-one would say that taking this long to get a plumber to visit the property for something as important as no heating or hot water is reasonable. However for a full boiler replacement with someone identifying the problem, a second opinion and quote, the parts ordered and a suitably qualified (as not everyone can do a job as big as this) person to have a big enough slot free to install and test it I think having that finalised in under 13 working days is reasonable.

Billie-S

jmt wrote: »

Some prospective tenants who just viewed a property I own are currently renting from a large Housing Assiciation. They told me that last year they were left without heating and hot water for 6 weeks :eek: so I feel that the OP and ihatemyhouse are being totally unfair - if you don't like your landlord - MOVE - it is your choice!

I find this very hard to believe.

jmt

Billie-S wrote: »

I find this very hard to believe.

I found it hard to believe, but the lady was adamant and still very angry which is why they were looking to move from HA rental to a private rental within the village. She also told me they had a water leak under the sink, they rang the HA who sent an emergency plumber that evening but all he did was turn water off at stop !!!!. They were without water over the weekend until a someone else turned up on Monday.

dodger1

SerialRenter wrote: »

"House! You were lucky to live in a house! We used to live in one room, all twenty-six of us, no furniture, 'alf the floor was missing, and we were all 'uddled together in one corner for fear of falling."

Yeah, but I bet you had a roof, we had a groundsheet in the local farmer's field. Some people just don't know how lucky they were