247 Home Rescue (boiler repair cover)

andrewlya

Hi, has anyone had any dealing with 247 Home Rescue? 

I have had a terrible experience with this firm, to get an idea of how bad it's been please read my letter of dissatisfaction to them. 

I feel my mum has been really taken advantage of by them. Is anyone else you maybe able to advice, maybe I could get my premiums refunded? It's been a truly shocking experience. 

"To the Complaint’s Manager,

 I am writing this complaint as I and my mum are very unhappy and very disappointed by the unfair treatment and misadvise we have experienced with 247 Home Rescue, which has not rescued my elderly mum’s home when her boiler broke down she was in the freezing cold house for nearly two weeks.

We joined 247 Home Rescue back in 2017 and had never missed a payment since then. As you can see we have been long-standing clients of yours and put our trust in your services.

On the 3rd of December, I’d to rung up Home Rescue to make a claim as my mum’s boiler totally broke down. My mum had no hot water and the weather was freezing cold. I paid the excess fee of £75 and had one of your engineers come out to have a look at it. The engineer came round on the day arranged and did not repair it at all, instead we had a call the next day to say you were not prepared to cover the repair costs and that we needed a new boiler as it is too old and can’t be covered on our policy.

 I am really not happy about this, because when I first took out this insurance I let you know the age of the boiler. Also when reviewed the boiler cover in March 2022 I had made it clear to your advisor on the phone that my mum’s boiler is 14 years, and it is on your records, and I specifically asked the advisor if the boiler, being 14 years of age, will still be covered for repairs and I was told that it will be covered regardless of its age. I decided to renew it and paid the premiums. Had I been properly advised that mum’s boiler is not insurable, I would have stopped the payments. I was not explained how the cover works and what level of cover the boiler would be covered for.

 Now when it had come to claim, I am told that the boiler is not insurable and you will not cover the costs of the repair even though my policy is meant to cover parts and labour, that is the whole purpose of this. Instead, I was inundated with phone calls, emails, and texts messages from yourselves about the new boiler installation. I was later given a quote of £254 to have it repaired. This begs the question, what is the point in having this boiler breakdown cover and paying for this for more than 5 years to still be told to cover the costs ourselves? This is the whole point of having this type of insurance cover so that we do not incur the costs ourselves. I knew how expensive it is to fix the boiler and this is why we had taken out the boiler repair service with yourselves so that you cover the costs but instead you have been taking our money for 5 years and still wanted us to cover the costs on top of that? Why have insurance then? What have we paid for? What kind of insurance is this that requires us to cover the repair costs?

Nevertheless, I naively decided to pay the fee of £254, as I did not want to go with the boiler replacement scheme you were insisting on getting, to have it fixed with Home Rescue as my mum was very cold and I needed to act quickly. I believe this fee should have been covered by your company. In the meantime whilst waiting for the appointment, I’d decided to get an independent gas engineer out to give us a second opinion. And it was a good job we did. The engineer had told us that the boiler is in too good condition to be replaced and should be repaired instead. He told us that it will only cost £40 for the part. The engineer repaired it and the boiler is now working heating the house and giving the hot water to my mum. I have now asked for a refund of this £254.

I believe we had been grossly misadvised, we feel Home Rescue just wanted to sell the new boiler when the current one is in a good condition, also the price quoted for repair was unfairly high, considering we paid the premiums in excess of over £1,000 over the course of 5 years you still wanted us to fund the cost of the repair as well when you promised to do this job for us.

 I am now under impression that Home Rescue has been dishonest with us, you have treated us unfairly, misadvised us regarding the condition of the current boiler to sell us a new, more expensive one with the interest payable over 5 or 10 years, when you could have just repaid the good boiler. You had taken the excess fee of £75 and then wanted me to also cover the extra £254, that is £329 in total, when it actually cost us £40 for the part. This is outrageous and your company needs to be seriously looked into by authorities and Trading Standards as you have no interest in covering the customers but only take the money.

Additionally, when I called up to request the refund on the 14th of December 2022 I spoke to one of your Advisors called Ibrahim, and expressed my concerns to him, he advised that a Manager will give me a call to discuss this issue.  Of course, no one has called me since then. I find it unacceptable and this again shows a complete disregard for your clients that pay you money to look after them.

I will await your response to my complaint as you have not delivered on your promise to repair our boiler knowing full well the make and age of the boiler and essentially passing the entire cost of repair onto us when it is your job to cover. This company needs to be taken to task as this has to be illegal what you have done to us.

This is actually 2nd time when you let us down. When we tried to make a boiler claim 1st time a few years ago you had refused to come to repair it because it did not meet your policy criteria. I did not cancel the cover then, even though I was not happy that you did not help us when we needed your assistance. Despite of 1st negative claim experience, I still decided to continue and give your company another chance. Back then I had called an independent gas engineer, paid the fee, and had the boiler repaired, whilst still continuing to pay the payments for the boiler cover with Home Rescue.

I, therefore, would like the following questions addressed:

1.       Why have you been taking our money every month all these years if the boiler is not insurable/ too old?  You knew the age of the boiler and its make. One of your engineers serviced it every year so you must have known, and have records about its condition whether it was still insurable or not and you at no point told me to stop paying the premiums as the insurance would not cover it.

2.       When I reviewed and renewed the boiler insurance in March 2022 I had specially asked if the boiler will be repaired in light of its age. It was confirmed to me by your Advisor it will be covered regardless of its age. Why was I misadvised on this? The advisor did not tell me what level of cover I was insured up to or that the boiler’s value would not support any claims or anything of the sort. The only response I had was that regardless of the boiler’s age the cover will insure the boiler for parts and labour, hence I happily renewed it.

We feel let down by your service, there has been a total disregard for the fact that my mum had no hot water and no heating in freezing weather conditions & you did not do your best to put it right. On top of everything, we had to incur more financial costs by having an independent engineer fix our boiler on two separate occasions when we had been paying you to do it.

Paying you for the cover has been a complete waste of time and a drain on my mum’s finances.

The Trading Standards will need to be aware of this so that other people are not taken advantage of like we have been.

I look forward to your prudent response and resolution to my complaint.

 

Your unhappy client"

Alderbank

You ask whether anyone has had any dealing with 247 Home Rescue? 

Lots of people on the MSE site have had (and regretted) dealings with them.
Here: 

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5141494/warning-re-24-7-home-rescue/p1

are 56 pages of posts stretching back over 7 years.

They include at least one poster who gives full details of how they successfully sued 247 Home Rescue in the small claims court.
You and your mum should read that thread.

andrewlya

Thank you, so why have Trading Standards not done anything about this rogue company? They haven't changed their ways,why do regulated allow them to carry on like that without having to improve?

user1977

andrewlya said:

Thank you, so why have Trading Standards not done anything about this rogue company?

Because Trading Standards are publicly-funded, and like many other "non-essential" services are first to suffer any cutbacks.

sheramber

andrewlya said:

Thank you, so why have Trading Standards not done anything about this rogue company? They haven't changed their ways,why do regulated allow them to carry on like that without having to improve?

Have you and the others who are unhappy reported them to Trading Standards?  Or, are you relying on somebody else doing it?

They will only act of they get several complaints.

andrewlya

sheramber said:

andrewlya said:

Thank you, so why have Trading Standards not done anything about this rogue company? They haven't changed their ways,why do regulated allow them to carry on like that without having to improve?

Have you and the others who are unhappy reported them to Trading Standards?  Or, are you relying on somebody else doing it?

They will only act of they get several complaints.

Well, they have been even sued so I am sure they have been reported many times over, just see the catalog of complaints...some has won a case against them on court 

oldagetraveller1

Yes, and was not impressed with their so-called service. I ended up having to change a circulating pump myself. Summer and no heating needed. Had to use immersion for h.w..

They are no worse than British Gas and their Homecare. Two no shows from them last week and the next available appointment is 6th Jan. 2023! Friday's was down as a "priority" too. Fortunately I still have heating and hot water because it's a "control" fault - dodgy 3 way diverter valve (sticking).

I have two separate complaints in to them.

born_again

andrewlya said:

sheramber said:

andrewlya said:

Thank you, so why have Trading Standards not done anything about this rogue company? They haven't changed their ways,why do regulated allow them to carry on like that without having to improve?

Have you and the others who are unhappy reported them to Trading Standards?  Or, are you relying on somebody else doing it?

They will only act of they get several complaints.

Well, they have been even sued so I am sure they have been reported many times over, just see the catalog of complaints...some has won a case against them on court 

Just because people complain on a public forum, or take them to court. Does not mean that they have reported them..

sheramber

You are sure somebody else has done so , but you have not. Why do you think others would if you don’t?

Alderbank

I would never bother trying to report anyone to Trading Standards.

Firstly, I would be focused on getting recompense. TS make it clear that they do not help consumers to enforce their statutory rights in any way.

Secondly, they don't accept calls from the public and have not done for some time.

sheramber

Yhat may be so but the OP expected TS to act and I was pointing out that unless they receive complaints they are not going to be taking any action.