advice please

Omollmeg

A colleague of mine with good english is renting a property with her husband.
it’s a 1 bedroom flat and there are only 2 of them living there.
Her gas & electric bills are about £150/month for both which i said is far too much!!
i was shocked
She said they don’t have a thermostat in the property so are unable to turn on or off the heating. She has asked her landlord but I think she just gets fobbed off.
Any ideas please of what she can do.
Thankyou.

Crashy_Time

Move to a property with a thermostat.

gettingtheresometime

What sort of tariff are they on?

G_M

So what kind of heating?


Gas boiler with rads? Electric storage heaters? Or something else?


What about hot water? Electric immersion heater? Off gas boiler?


Cooker?


Have they written to the landlord, at the proper address,

a) asking where the controls are and how they work, or if none, to have a thermostat and time-switch installed?


b) if yes, without response, try the Private Tenancy Officer at the council or Environmental Health.


Or find a better managed property. Are they in a fixed term tenancy?

davidmcn

If it's a self-contained flat, why can't they at least control whether the heating is on or off? Do they have their own meters and have accounts directly with the utilities? If so then they may wish to check elsewhere on this site about looking for competitive tariffs.

Also bear in mind that there are many variables so £150/month isn't necessarily "wrong" - depends how big the flat is ("1 bedroom" could be anything from a modern shoebox to a vast Victorian property with 12 foot high ceilings, draughts and no insulation), how many hours the flat is occupied, what sort of temperature they are heating it up to, where in the country they are, etc.

tacpot12

They could employ a handyman to investigate what their heating system is. If they don't understand the system and whether it is working correctly, someone who is handy will be able to investigate and tell them what their option are. If the flat has a gas boiler, a Gassafe Registered engineer would be better than a handyman, but more expensive and harder to find. It will be worth it though. £150 is a lot per month, if they spend £50 with a handyman and he can show them how to turn the heating system off and on, it will be will worth it.

Omollmeg

THanks for the responses.
Ok in the small 1 bedroomed flat they have radiators and a Worcester boiler but there isn't a thermostat in the flat to regulate different temperatures(which I found odd however after reading other info it seems they are not alone)
They can only have it on or off so unless they are away they leave it on as they work shift work so can't keep going back to a cold flat.
She is looking around for new tariffs but still won't sole their problem.
I'm just frustrated for them as I know they are paying about double what they should be....
I have advised her to speak to her landlord again..
Thanks all

ognum

Omollmeg wrote: »

THanks for the responses.
Ok in the small 1 bedroomed flat they have radiators and a Worcester boiler but there isn't a thermostat in the flat to regulate different temperatures(which I found odd however after reading other info it seems they are not alone)
They can only have it on or off so unless they are away they leave it on as they work shift work so can't keep going back to a cold flat.
She is looking around for new tariffs but still won't sole their problem.
I'm just frustrated for them as I know they are paying about double what they should be....
I have advised her to speak to her landlord again..
Thanks all

Frankly I think it’s ridiculous to leave the heating on all the time. I would have off as the default, I assume they can just put an extra sweater on u til it heats up.

We are at home most of the time and most of the time the heating is off.

davidmcn

Omollmeg wrote: »

they have radiators and a Worcester boiler but there isn't a thermostat in the flat to regulate different temperatures(which I found odd however after reading other info it seems they are not alone)
They can only have it on or off so unless they are away they leave it on as they work shift work so can't keep going back to a cold flat.
She is looking around for new tariffs but still won't sole their problem.
I'm just frustrated for them as I know they are paying about double what they should be....
I have advised her to speak to her landlord again..

There will at least be a thermostat on the boiler to regulate the temperature of the water in the circuit - they could turn that down.

The landlord isn't obliged to upgrade the heating system beyond what was there when they originally moved in, though adding a programmer won't break the bank.

Cakeguts

Are there thermostat controls on each radiator. If you have those you don't need a thermostat.

datlex

When I moved in here the boiler had been adjusted so that it was either on or off. The old lady living here before did not understand how to use a thermostat and the boiler had been adjusted so that the controls were removed. It was easily rectified with a portable thermostat.