Enquiry about a company

[Roberts]

I was contacted by phone and told that my fuse box was over 40 years old and needed to be replaced. The company Electrical Safety Group gave the impresion that they were linked to a energy supplier. They came to the house and checked the wiring and left a a list of things to be done costing about £800 on reading their inspection report they say (in small print) at the bottom of the page that they are not part of any public energy supplier. I am beginning to think that this is some sort of scam. What do the panel of experts think? Someone in this newsgroup must know more than me Thanks in advance Robbie

[Andy Burns]

Scammers.

No doubt their report highlights every possible item for bringing the installation to current standards ... unless you want this doing (or are having other electrical work done) there is no requirement to do this.

[Andy Burns]

Worth detailing here what work they've said is "necessary" for people to comment on.

[Andy Cap]

Sounds like the meter reader's got themselves a side-line going, providing this company with contacts. Unless you've noticed problems yourself - which *should* of course be addressed - then put their report in the bin.

Andy C

[Tim Watts]

Scam.

Tell them to piss off or if you're up to it, get them back and waste their time a bit. On no account given them sany money or sign anything.

[Andrew Gabriel]

Many of the energy suppliers' contracting departments also do this.

Like others asked, what did their report say?

An old wylex fuse box will often need replacing after about 40 years. Some of the internal conductor connections can go high contact resistance and start overheating, damaging surrounding insulation. That's easy to check for by visual inspection.

But that doesn't cost anything like £800, even if you replaced it with the bee's knees all RCBOs protection.

[Paul - xxx]

... and don't leave them alone in a room, or allow them to start any work _whatsoever_ .. :)

[Brian Gaff]

There are lots of people doing this sort of thing. Home security is busy doing it a lot, so I imagine there are other angles. I never allow anyone access who calls cold by phone or at the door. I'm too much of a cynic but I guess some might be OK, but it makes you think if these folk were good, how come they need to use such dodgy practices to get work?

Brian

[Brian Gaff]

No its a load of tosh. The other folk who are constantly coming out of the woodwork are aerial riggers usually about three months before the region goes completely digital. Completely ignoring the fact that many of the people they contact are elidgible to get it done by the government sceme for forty quid, they charge over 200 for a botched up job with a cheap aerial. Brian

[Roberts]

If I was n't too old I would be rioting too!!! Robbie.

[Phil L]

Everyone who rings up out of the blue and asks me for £800 always get paid, it's only common courtesy.

[Newshound]

+1

[Jules Richardson]

Invite them back and offer them a nice cup of 2x4" :-)

[Geo]

Well - their bank balance is £367 so another £800 would be welcome...

[Jules Richardson]

I've got three fuseboxes in use here, plus a couple of big ol' knife switches, plus a couple of breaker panels, plus some load control relay boxes - the setup's all a little quirky.

I do rather miss UK electrics :-)

cheers

Jules

[John Williamson]

Sounds as if you might need an Igor to connect the lightning conductor to the operating tabe.

[Andrew May]

cannot find anything about them on the stock exchange site. Anyone know what their ticker code is?

[chrisj.doran%proemail.co.uk]

There are two kinds of "fusebox": the _company_ fusebox between the cables coming in from the street and the meter which you (should) never touch, and the one between the meter and the house wiring, normally referred to as a "consumer unit", where you replace fuses yourself.

It's most unlikely that the electricity company would know anything about the age of your CU. Maybe Electrical Safety Group have been contracted to deal with replacements of company fuseboxes (wholly at the company's expense) and are riding on this to do "free safety checks" of customers' installations. Nothing inherently wrong with this, but they should not be scaring people into unnecessary work. A Watchdog investigation a while back found cowboy firms replacing consumer units unnecessarily (even a brand new one that a former cowboy had done them for the previous day). If ESG are in this category, they should be reported to some or all of the power company, Trading Standards (see your Council's website), and/or people like Watchdog.

Latest cold-calling craze around here is "Have you had your government grant for top-up loft insulation?" As it's not a 100% grant and you can't DIY, I doubt if it's financially worthwhile.

Chris

[Jethro]

Funny, had a guy last week knocking ... his little face fell, when I detailed exactly what we had done, down to the draught excluder on the bin store door.

We did very well out of that, actually. We had the loft completely insulated, plus the loft hatch. Cavity wall insulation. And, because we are a unique property, apparently, (3 bed bungalow with a ludicrously large footprint) a team from Cardiff University paid us £150 to have some

24/7 wall sensors fitted (they were poles that went between floor and ceiling with a probe that touched the wall) for a week before, and a week after. The guy in charge of the study was a real geek ... it's rare to meet someone that is *that* into their work. I got several brownie points for my recollection of black box radiation ... and he did an external survey, with an IR camera, which showed that we were very well insulated.

[GB]

You forgot to mention your number, Phil.