Engineer didn't fix boiler - do I pay?

Pineapple88

Hi everyone,

I'd appreciate some thoughts on how to resolve an issue with my boiler.

I bought a house in the autumn and when I moved in the boiler wasn't working (I had asked for a gas safe check but the vendor insisted on getting her own gas safe engineer to carry it out so whilst I have the gas safe certificate I suspect its not work the paper its printed on). The house has been empty whilst I have been renovating it and so I only needed to put the heating on a few weeks ago. When I turned it on the boiler showed a fault code (L9) came on and then turned off a few minutes later. I left it on for a few hours (but no heat came through) and it started to make a loud banging/mechanical whirring noise and then started to smell of burning. I got a gas engineer round and he said that the circuit board had burnt through and needed replacing (I asked what had caused it to burn though but he wasn't able to say) and there had also been a leak and so I needed a new valve and sensor. He fixed these yesterday, turned the boiler on and it worked (I don't know how long he left it on for though). When I went round today sure enough the boiler came on but 10 minutes later it turned itself off. Now it won't come back on and is showing the L9 fault again.

I haven't paid the gas engineer for the work yet and don't want to leave him out of pocket but also don't want to pay for work that doesn't seem to have done anything to fix the fault, particularly if I will need to get a new boiler. I'd appreciate some advice on how to approach it. Would you pay him the full amount?

Any advice much appreciated

[Deleted User]

I'd call him and talk to him.

Carrot007

Deleted_User wrote: »

I'd call him and talk to him.

Indeed, whilse the things he fixed probably needed doing he appears not to have fixed the L9 Cause.

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/3065904

Alex1983

I’m guessing it’s a isar/icos, if so I’d get him back and check the boiler isn’t leaking on to the PCB. L9 is overheat, the system have water in it and rads vented.

Pineapple88

Thanks everyone. I'm going to give him a ring in the near year but am trying to figure out the best way to approach it.

Alex1983 - yeah it's an Ideal boiler. A bit of research seems to suggest that they are rubbish and better to replace than repair. I was hoping to get a few years out of it before replacing it but it is looking like I might need to just bite the bullet and get a new one!

Pineapple88

Alex1983- what do you mean by rads vented? Should I check that they are turned on? They warmed up for the 10 minutes when the boiler was on.

Nilrem

Vented - bled I assume, basically open the little valve near the top if the radiator (usually on the end, but sometimes on the flat surface near the end) and make sure there is no air in there.
Hold an old towel under/around the vent to catch drips.

You'll need a radiator key, which if you don't have one it is something any hardware store and many supermarkets will carry (as will the likes of poundland from memory).
It'll normally look something like
this or this, I prefer the first type as it's got larger flat bits to apply pressure to which is less painful if the valve is hard to open.

Furts

All sounds a bit strange to me. There was an obvious fault with an obvious code which any half decent person could define simply by googling. Parts have been replaced, which it seems has nothing to do with the fault, and the fault code is still there.

I hold my hands up - I am happy with building but I am not time served in plumbing/heating. But it does sound to me like the person who came out was not competent.

Alex1983

These models are very problematic and PCB’s go all the time, it can be difficult to fault find sometimes. If the boiler had a fault code and the engineer replaced the PCB and the boiler worked it’s probably fair to say he though that fixed it, think it’s a little harsh to say he wasn’t competent.

He needs to come back and carry out some more tests, have you bled the rads and got the right pressure in the boiler. I’d also get him, as I’ve said check for leaks above and the PCB to make sure there is no water on it and also these PCB’s need to be set up for the relevant model by positioning some pins in to different positions, be worth him checking that.

bris

Furts wrote: »

All sounds a bit strange to me. There was an obvious fault with an obvious code which any half decent person could define simply by googling. Parts have been replaced, which it seems has nothing to do with the fault, and the fault code is still there.

I hold my hands up - I am happy with building but I am not time served in plumbing/heating. But it does sound to me like the person who came out was not competent.

It's not as easy as that. Fault codes are very often misleading and boiler repair is often very problematic because one fault can have five or six different things it can be.


It's easy for a BG engineer to turn up at a job and replace everything as they often do because they don't pay for or have to charge the customer so just a general idea of what parts need replaced is good enough for them.


For an engineer like me I tend to start at the obvious and cheapest solution on problems like this but the customer doesn't want trial and error of expensive parts as that is often what it boils down too. Multi meters help but unusual situations arise.


In this case something is blowing the PCB, possibly the fan or pump are usual suspects but they can be checked, an earth fault, who knows but the first thing when a PCB goes is to investigate why. Some PCB's are poorly made and often it's just that, but the point is the engineer gambled and it didn't pay off. I have been there, don't know any who haven't.

Pineapple88

Thanks everyone. I've not bled the radiators yet -I thought the heating needed to be on in order to push the water round so will it work with the heat off?

The problem was the boiler was making a loud noise (from a quick look on YouTube it sounds like it could be the pump) but then the circuit board cut out and the boiler wouldn't turn on so I guess the engineer had to replace this before diagnosing any other problems. The same thing has happened this time - loud noise for a few minutes followed by the boiler cutting out and now it is showing the L9 fault code and won't come back on. Luckily this time I videoed the noise on my phone before it cut out so I can show it to him when he comes back.

The pressure should be ok - there was a leak and it went to 0 but he replaced the part and now the pressure is steady at 1.