Boiler and heating cover

whitelightning

Hi,

Any recommendations for boiler and heating cover policies?

I was tempted to go with the HomeServe Cover 8 with Annual Boiler Service for £9.50 a month except when I read that the boiler service will be carried out between April and September 2015.

I would prefer a cover with boiler service but almost immediate and not 6 months from now. I can't see anything on British Gas or NPower T&C. Does anyone know when they carry it out?

Any other companies to look out for?

Thanks.

Sterlingtimes

I have just cancelled NPower now at over £20 a month.

Difficulties are as follows:

[1] investigation visit on a callout is an all day visit. You have to plan to be at home all day.

[2] fixing visit with parts is also an all day visit. You have to plan to at home all day.

[3] service visit may also be an all day appointment.

[4] intermittent problems are excluded from the cover. NPower will bodge the system to get it working, but you may still employ a plumber to correct recurrent intermittent problems.

[5] NPower can take a long time to answer the 'phone. I have experienced 25 minutes.

good_advice

Just paid £102 for Homeserve Gas central heating breakdown cover with an annual service for the year.
Could have chosen £8.50 DD.

This is for a first year contract with £50 excess per claim.
Cannot make a claim in first 28 days. This gives only 11 months cover.
Free boiler service between April - September.

Quidco cashback = hopefully £30?

daveprops

Homeserve are owned by British Gas so expect the same standards of cover.... dreadful! I was covered by Homeserve for 2 years and never needed to claim however my monthly cost never once went down. Back in June I needed to claim due to a leak in my property.. Homeserve did everything they could to find a reason not to attend and once agreeing to attend after hours of being passed around call centres across the globe the engineer didn't even turn up. I cancelled my policy and shopped around and came across an independent company based in the North West called UK Homecare who are cheaper & when I needed to claim for a small issue with my washing machine they couldn't do enough oh and their engineer came at a time agreed. I've only been with them for 2 months but so far so good in 2 months they've done more for me than homeserve did in 2 years. Highly recommended uk-homecare .co.uk is their web address for anyone anti Homeserve & British Gas

HomeServe_company_representative

Good evening daveprops,

I am so sorry to hear you have been disappointed in our service. After reading your review below I am unsure whether you are referring to a HomeServe policy you held with us or a British Gas Homecare Policy. HomeServe is not owned by British Gas we are a separate Insurance company. If you were a HomeServe policy holder, we would really like the opportunity to investigate the concerns you have highlighted. Please could you send your address details or policy number to our Here To Help Team email address which is located on our profile page.

Kindest Regards

Anna Mahon
Here To Help Team
HomeServe

Cardew

daveprops wrote: »

Homeserve are owned by British Gas so expect the same standards of cover.... dreadful! I was covered by Homeserve for 2 years and never needed to claim however my monthly cost never once went down. Back in June I needed to claim due to a leak in my property.. Homeserve did everything they could to find a reason not to attend and once agreeing to attend after hours of being passed around call centres across the globe the engineer didn't even turn up. I cancelled my policy and shopped around and came across an independent company based in the North West called UK Homecare who are cheaper & when I needed to claim for a small issue with my washing machine they couldn't do enough oh and their engineer came at a time agreed. I've only been with them for 2 months but so far so good in 2 months they've done more for me than homeserve did in 2 years. Highly recommended uk-homecare .co.uk is their web address for anyone anti Homeserve & British Gas

Welcome to the forum.


Apart from getting Homeserve mixed up with Homecare, don't you feel it is a little premature to 'highly recommend' your chosen service after only 2 months?


A search of MSE will reveal hundreds of posts about HomeServe and Homecare.


Here are a couple for Homeserve.


https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4896159


https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4896159

Pincher

Check out Heat Team, they specialise in Baxi, Main, Potterton and Remeha boilers. Think of them as the Vauxhall dealer network for GM cars that will also service Volkswagons. I have a Potterton in one house, and there is nothing wrong with them.


If you just accept a boiler is like a car, with an engine that needs service from a TRAINED engineer, and budget accordingly, going with Heat Team or its equivalent from other manufacturers will be as natural as brushing your teeth.


Yes, I know, some people smell like they don't believe in regular brushing: it's just too much effort!

Zappa001

We took out "central heating care" middle of September and my experience of HES is pretty abysmal. You are not properly covered until the initial inspection, even if you have paid premiums, which they say they will carry out within 28 days. They didn’t come to ours for almost double that. When the engineer arrived he went through long rigmarole telling me why he was unable to even look at the boiler as there was insufficient room for him to be able to work on it and this was against health and safety regulations mumbling that should it ever need a new heat exchanger they were very heavy. Our boiler is located up the wall in the downstairs toilet of an ordinary 1930's semi and he said that the toilet impeded his access (all it needs is a simple work platform to stand on over the top of it). He made a few feeble attempts using my ladder and our kitchen steps (neither of which had been checked by health and safety) but gave up pretty quickly. I told him I disagreed with his conclusion because it had self-evidently been installed without a problem and had been serviced by our local engineer on a regular basis using same set of ladders without any difficulty right up until he stopped doing gas work last year. The HES man said that as our bloke was self employed he could disregard health and safety! He said if he were to complete the service and later his supervisor were to say access is unsafe the insurance would be null and void and our payments would be for nothing, plus they wouldn't pay out for any claim. Then to top it all off he said he could not say that boiler was deemed to be safe because he had not inspected it. It is blatantly obvious that he just didn’t want to do this job and was looking for any excuse. Hopeless; I would not bother with them if I were you, a very poor service and the only plus is its better find out how useless they are before an emergency than during one.

citykid5

I'm just coming to the end of a 1 yr contract with homeserve, although it was only plumbing cover and not c/h . I must say their service has been pretty good. I've needed to call them out 3 times . Once for a leaking mixer tap, they arrived on time and replaced the whole tap at no additional cost to me. The second was a siphoning toilet , arrived when they said they would and replaced the flushing mechanism . Third was a leaky toilet. Canceled their original appointment due to being held up on a job so arrived next morning and fixed the problem. I'm intending to renew again with them this year .

lonestarfan

I've always used British Gas for nearly 30 yrs and wouldn't switch now. When they got too expensive one year I canceled and joined 3 months later at a new customer price but of course had to cover it myself if it went wrong in the short time. I did have a spell of 2/3 years where it was covered by other company but I've never been as satisfied as with the peace of mind I get with BG.
I do have a Sheilas Wheels home contents and buildings insurance policy and once had to use the emergency cover for the heating and was impressed. It's no substitute for a whole policy but was good for the event.
I considered self insurance a few times but since my boiler was installed in 2005 it has generally had a fault every year without fail so I prefer to have a policy.
Sheilas Wheels contents and building insurance comes with the option of home emergency insurance, to give you a single phone call solution to your domestic emergency. If you have our home emergency insurance option, all you need to do is to ring us if your central heating breaks down, you discover a water leak or your drains become blocked. We’ll arrange for a contractor to come and sort out your problem. No ringing around or out of hours rates to worry about – just a single phone call and we’ll arrange for emergency repairs from a reputable contractor subject to an overall limit of £500 (including VAT) for the call out charge and up to 2 hours labour, plus parts and materials up to a maximum of £100 (including VAT).

FaIrPlAy8

citykid5 wrote: »

I'm just coming to the end of a 1 yr contract with homeserve, although it was only plumbing cover and not c/h . I must say their service has been pretty good. I've needed to call them out 3 times . Once for a leaking mixer tap, they arrived on time and replaced the whole tap at no additional cost to me. The second was a siphoning toilet , arrived when they said they would and replaced the flushing mechanism . Third was a leaky toilet. Canceled their original appointment due to being held up on a job so arrived next morning and fixed the problem. I'm intending to renew again with them this year .

Check very carefully the cost of the policy for the 2nd year, callouts will dramatically increase the renewal cost. You will receive a letter that states "there is no need to do anything, your cover will renew automatically" I have recently stopped a friend from paying almost £600 a year for a cover8 policy (when we questioned the cost Homeserve tell me this is a normal cost paid by their customers) and it would have been even more on renewal. Every Homeserve customer should let their contract end after the 1st year, wait a couple of weeks and take out a new policy, they would then get all the benefits of being a new customer, do not stay with Homeserve longer than one year, they do not recognise customer loyalty and renewing the policy will only lead to an increased payment on renewal.