purchasing property with wood burner - no HETAS certificate or service history

phoebe1989seb

Davesnave wrote: »

If I had a cob and thatch property like some of my friends, I believe it could well be a condition of insurance, but for my more modern box.....no.

And as I've proved to my own satisfaction, it doesn't seem to matter too much who sticks the rods up a bungalow's 6m flue.

This ^

Even for our previous property (Georgian thatched house) it wasn't a condition of our (specialist) insurance We also swept our own chimneys and certainly never had our 20 year old - installed by PO - woodburner serviced or tested by a HETAS engineer. Our buyers/their lender/solicitor/surveyor never mentioned certificates either.......

Davesnave

The "needed for insurance" yarn was spun by a HETAS registered sweep to one of my friends a while ago. He checked with the NFU, who insure his (modern) farm, who said it was nonsense.

The friend decided not to employ the same guy again.

beachcomber02

A couple of years ago I bought a very nice house which had a woodburner installed. It was quite a new house and had been signed off by Building Control etc. When we moved in we found that the stove didn't work very well and decided to have a new Morso log burner installed. A Hetas approved installer came to survey the job and found that the existing stove hadn't been properly fitted and on further inspection found that, instead of the specified clay liners, steel liners had been fitted within a 'chimney breast' - this was despite Building Control having certified that the proper liners were fitted. To avoid any doubt here, this was inspected by a number of certified installers and an architect along with other professionals who all concur that this was unsafe and illegal. The steel liners were positioned close to combustible materials and there were a number of very serious safety issues raised which meant that the existing chimney had to be condemned and a new one built. I had the property inspected by an experienced building contractor prior to purchase but these faults were all hidden and didn't become fully apparent until a wall was demolished. We now have a new external chimney which meets and exceeds all the regulations but it has been a very expensive lesson. The solicitor who handled the transaction failed us by not obtaining the necessary certifications and Building Control weren't interested even though they had certified that the chimney complied with regulations when even the briefest of inspections would have revealed that it did not. So the lesson that I have learned is that you cannot rely on these people. In future I will not proceed with any house purchase until I am fully satisfied myself that all is in order.

keith969

I had a woodburner installed some 7 or 8 years ago by a HETAS certified engineer, still got the certificate. He put the stove in too close to the rear of the fireplace, so the rendering cracked and discoloured. And he managed to install it such that the flue was at a slight but noticeable angle, and claimed it had to be that way (it didn't). Lastly he cut a bit of expensive granite incorrectly and had to replace it at his own cost.

I didn't trust him to fix it, having a HETAS certificate is about as much use as a chocolate teapot.

[Deleted User]

beachcomber02 wrote: »

A couple of years ago I bought a very nice house which had a woodburner installed. It was quite a new house and had been signed off by Building Control etc. When we moved in we found that the stove didn't work very well and decided to have a new Morso log burner installed. A Hetas approved installer came to survey the job and found that the existing stove hadn't been properly fitted and on further inspection found that, instead of the specified clay liners, steel liners had been fitted within a 'chimney breast' - this was despite Building Control having certified that the proper liners were fitted. To avoid any doubt here, this was inspected by a number of certified installers and an architect along with other professionals who all concur that this was unsafe and illegal. The steel liners were positioned close to combustible materials and there were a number of very serious safety issues raised which meant that the existing chimney had to be condemned and a new one built. I had the property inspected by an experienced building contractor prior to purchase but these faults were all hidden and didn't become fully apparent until a wall was demolished. We now have a new external chimney which meets and exceeds all the regulations but it has been a very expensive lesson. The solicitor who handled the transaction failed us by not obtaining the necessary certifications and Building Control weren't interested even though they had certified that the chimney complied with regulations when even the briefest of inspections would have revealed that it did not. So the lesson that I have learned is that you cannot rely on these people. In future I will not proceed with any house purchase until I am fully satisfied myself that all is in order.

Surely you pull the old liner out and put a new one in. Heck my old Parkray didn't even have a liner and it was completely legal.