No working boiler for over 4 months

Stylish3

We have been without a working boiler for over 4 months thanks to an error from Homecare engineer. Have lodged a complaint today, are you able to please advise what would be appropriate compensation for the (obviously) severe inconvenience.

Thanks

victor2

You have presumably been using electric heating when needed and gas/electric stove or kettle to heat water instead of using the boiler. If you have your utility bills for last year, compare what you were charged over the last 4 months to what you would have paid if you'd used the gas and electric kWh you actually used in the same period a year ago. Bit of maths involved, but nothing terribly difficult. That gives an idea of the actual extra cost incurred and is the minimum compensation you can say is acceptable, assuming they accept it is their fault.

Stylish3

Another engineer has been this week and was easily able to repair it by replacing one part. Covid clearly further complicated the issue as my husband has been shielding and Homecare were only dealing with emergencies.

We had to purchase quite a number of plug in heaters which were expensive to run.  I’ll attempt to calculate excess electricity used for the duration.

I wasn’t sure whether there was an industry standard daily/ weekly rate for similar issues.

Thanks

TadleyBaggie

Surely you haven't needed to use heaters for 3 months or more with the decent spring weather we had. So claiming extra heating for the whole period would not seem appropriate to me.

The_Fat_Controller

@TadleyBaggie, try living on the west coast of Scotland for a while !

The OP could be elderly or infirm and need heating, your comment is a bit harsh.

rp1974

If your cold,heating goes on.I live in Glasgow my heating switches on if the temperature drops below 18 degrees.It has done this a few times since April.Immaterial if its January or July.Sounds like the OP wants reimbursement for the electricity used due to the faulty boiler,fair enough to me.

Stylish3

As Victor kindly suggested, I calculated how much extra electricity we used in comparison to the same period last year and it was over double the amount as we also had to use the immersion to (try) and heat water for showers etc. 

There were days over the time without a boiler where the temperatures was around zero.

richardadc

Stylish3 said:

Covid clearly further complicated the issue as my husband has been shielding and Homecare were only dealing with emergencies.

If your husband has been shielding is this the reason why they hadn't been out?  No hot water/heating is also normally counted as an emergency.

Regarding compensation this isn't normal times and I don't think it would be fair for Homecare to take all the responsibility if the delay was to do with Covid.  If the shielding was the reason they couldn't come out then if that was part of the government guidance then I'm not sure any compensation could really be offered (depending on what the original mistake was).

Depending on your answers a small goodwill gesture may be all you can really expect.  

RelievedSheff

richardadc said:

Stylish3 said:

Covid clearly further complicated the issue as my husband has been shielding and Homecare were only dealing with emergencies.

If your husband has been shielding is this the reason why they hadn't been out?  No hot water/heating is also normally counted as an emergency.

Regarding compensation this isn't normal times and I don't think it would be fair for Homecare to take all the responsibility if the delay was to do with Covid.  If the shielding was the reason they couldn't come out then if that was part of the government guidance then I'm not sure any compensation could really be offered (depending on what the original mistake was).

Depending on your answers a small goodwill gesture may be all you can really expect.  

No heating or hot water at all would be an emergency but the OP did have not water and heating albeit from different sources. They had electric heaters and the immersion heater, so really I don't think they would have been classed as an emergency case.

The past four months have been far from normal for everyone and you can't really blame homecare for that. Covid was beyond everyone's control and still remains so.

oldagetraveller1

"No heating or hot water at all would be an emergency but the OP did have not water and heating albeit from different sources."

And unless the o.p. told Homecare that, how would they know?

MWT

oldagetraveller1 said:

"No heating or hot water at all would be an emergency but the OP did have not water and heating albeit from different sources."

And unless the o.p. told Homecare that, how would they know?

I'd flip that the other way around, Homecare were dealing with emergencies, but it looks like the OP didn't raise it with them as an emergency... ?

I'd still ask for some form of compensation as long as the original engineer did actually make a mistake and wasn't simply waiting for a part that hadn't been anticipated as necessary...