Recourse options

[asalcedo]

My power shower failed. No flow of water at all.

A plumber from a well known local company said the pump had failed. He changed the pump and the problem was the same.

Through a friend I have now found out that the problem seems to be just a stuck washer in the on/off handle valve.

Most likely the old pump was fine.

I have asked the plumber to give me the old pump. They are not replying. Surely they charged my credit card for the pump plus more than the agreed hours (total of £800)

Are they required to give me the old equipment?

Do I have any recourse against their wrong assessment and unnecesary replacement?

Thanks,

Antonio

[Ron Lowe]

You should not have let him go when he replaced the pump and it was the same. You asked him to fix the shower, and it was not fixed. Why was anything paid.

In regard to getting a refund for poor fault-finding and the un-necessary costs, I'd say you have about much chance as trying to get a car garage to refund/replace original parts they swapped out whilst failing to cure a fault.

The basic mindset it to replace parts at random at the customer's expense, as an experiment to see if that fixes the fault. If not, then we go on to replace something else. Rinse and repeat.

So having determined that X is NOT at fault, do we put the original back, and refund the cost? Ha Ha. No.

For a small independent who had to buy the part, I can see the logic. For a main dealer, who can pull one off the shelf and try it, and if it doesn't help, put it back, then no, that's not right. They should replace the original. IMHO.

[John Rumm]

Talk to the credit card company if you get no joy from the original supplier. The cc company have joint and several liability with the supplier, and so can issue you with a refund and force a charge back on the supplier.

Sadly, according to a mechanic friend of mine, some modern cars actually enforce this behaviour - especially BMW and Mercs it seems. Many items will refuse to work with the car until programmed with the cars unique ID code. Once programmed they are then permanently tied to that vehicle and can't be used on another. Net result is you can't substitute a spare part during fault finding and then remove it if it proves to not cure the fault. You have to install a new part, and that then immediately becomes worthless to anyone else.

[asalcedo]

I do massive amounts of DIY. Massive. To, I want to believe, very high standards and levels of sophistication. If I had been there this problem would have been fixed in minutes.

But this time I am out of the country.

Anyway, because I knew what I was talking about I have been able to show the plumbing company that they were wrong and they have agreed to refund me enough for me to be happy.

[Grimly Curmudgeon]

Of course; it's your property and never became theirs.

Small Claims Court.