gas safe plumbers: greedy and unethical?

Hi,

Often plumbers are portrayed on television as being robbers and I am inclined to agree.

I let out the house where I used to live. You may remember me recently saying the tenant had no hot water. The plumber said it needed a new expansion vessel and a new PCB. he claimed this was an uneconomical repair, he said it would cost £400 to repair it but recommended spending twice as much to replace the boiler. I can't see how that makes the repair uneconomic when it is less than half the cost of a new boiler.

The advice here was to make the repairs. Geoff told me he could supply a reconditioned PCB for £50. The plumber has gone AWOL. It seems to me he lost interest when I did not want to pay for a new boiler. My poor tenant is still without hot water.

I'm guessing only a gas safe registered person can fit the PCB as it involves opening the boiler in a rented house?

I typed the postcode into the gas safe web site and emailed all the local plumbers.

The first plumber to reply said: "I don't deal with reconditioned parts even if they have a warranty". He then said he would want payment up front "because I don't know you... Sorry about this but I live and learn!". I felt tempted to reply "I am not paying you up front because I don't know you!" What's to stop him running off with my money without doing the work?

Second plumber said: "Unfortunately we do not carry out repairs to boilers we only carry out full systems or boiler replacements. This is due to experience, we have replaced certain parts on boilers in the past but once a boiler starts to fail it is inevitable at some point that it will fail completely and it is then seen as our fault for not recommending this.

In my opinion I feel that a new boiler would be the best course of action to take to save yourself money/expense in the long run, especially if you are renting the property."

So on this basis I should not replace my tyres or brake pads when they are worn, I must buy a new car? What a load of nonsense!

Third plumber said: "[company name] would not be prepared to install reconditioned parts, personally I do not feel this is the best approach and would therefore not wish to offer you a below standard level of service."

Fourth plumber said: " to be fair I wouldn't fit a reconditioned PCB board it would have to be new... £40 to diagnose but to be fair that boiler is over 10 years old. Too many times you find you repair what's wrong with it now and then something else will be going wrong. It might be better to cut your losses now and install a new boiler.

Fifth plumber said: "I don't deal in second hand parts especially PCB's. I would expect the job to be more expensive fitting an external expansion vessel due to the system having to be drained down first, refilled then vented."

I haven't has a system with an expansion vessel before, but wouldn't the system need to be drained to replace the one in the boiler too? Or why not freeze the pipe work either side?

I have had one chap reply that he can help, so hopefully it will get sorted out soon. It seems to me that the others re just greedy and want a bigger job with a larger mark-up.

What is the market like for plumbers: does demand exceed supply? I am amazed seven plumbers think they can afford to turn the work down.

OFTEC plumbers are not any better. I had half a dozen OFTEC plumbers tell me I needed a new boiler in my house until I found one plumber that was able to repair the fault for a fraction of the price.

Reply to
Fred
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You should watch 'Show me your money' on 4OD. It was a fly-on-the-wall doc about Pimlico Plumbers where the boss was trying to get some sort of order into pay scales to avoid being cornered every few days by someone wanting a payrise - which I suspect he just agreed to, knowing that being a London-based business, the customer will always pay.

The lowest paid person was the canteen lady on £14,500, and she chose to travel 4 hours a day to do the job rather than go on the dole.

The program concentrated on the admin and garage people, so we never got to know what all the tradesmen were being paid, but most of them seemed to be earning £65K upwards, and one of the shit-unblockers claimed he was on £150K. We never found out if they were on PAYE or some form of sub-contractors.

Reply to
Andrew

I think its often that they have been bitten once and its been a very bad experience. bad news travels faster than good so theyavoid the problem.

Brian

Reply to
Brian Gaff

Without the full facts, and condition/age, he may be right. My parents boiler failed this week, presumed to be a faulty gas valve. My mate could fit it, but said as the boiler is 30 years old, it may be more economic to fit a new boiler, as they'll both save gas, and have no repairs in the next 5 years (Glowworm 5 year warranty). £100-150 repair, or £1k for new boiler?

No. It isnt touching the gas, so you can do it if you are competent.

And when you have been in business a while, you know that Landlords supplying parts can be the worst customers. How does he know what condition the part is in? Its easy to say it is a good part, but he has to fit it, and make it work, do you pay him extra if it is faulty? I've got an outstanding bill from January for a Landlord who was "desperate" to get his tenants washing machine fitted, and was most grateful that it was doen the same day. My £30 bill has not been paid yet. I dont work for Landlords if at all possible. With a few exceptions they always want a cheap job, done immediately, then take an age to pay.

Which is true. New pcb fitted, then still doesnt work. What next? Blame them for fitting it wrongly? Blame the original diagnosis?

Which could be true, as above.

But if your car was 15 years old, was inefficient, and it wasnt exactly sure what was wrong with it, then the best course may be to scrap it.

If repairs to my car came to half of the cost of a new one , then there is no way I'd try to keep the old one running.

As he cannot guarantee the parts, I would agree. I'm sure Geoffs parts are excellent, but others dont know that. ...

No, they know it can be more trouble that it is worth. Their view immediately, is: Minus points: You are a Landlord, they need to deal with a Tenant, someone else has diagnosed the fault, someone else has clearly turned down the work, you have bought recon parts to be used. Plus points. £100 to fit a PCB and make the boiler work? Then, you think, "well, what if it isnt the PCB?" You politely decline the work.

Reply to
A.Lee

It's all crazy. Gas fitters set ridiculously high hourly rates, then of course they can't risk fitting recon parts because it might be wasting their ever so valuable time. We have a couple of local CORGI types and, judging by the time their vans spend at home on their drives, they're not as busy as they'd have you believe. Halve the rates and treble the income might be a good strategy in a recession.

Reply to
stuart noble

In message , Fred writes

If they all said this I have to wonder who Geoff's customers are then? They can't all be diyers surely?

Thinking of this I wonder if Geoff would know a suitable plumber, customer, in your area that is prepared to use re-con' parts?

Reply to
Bill

Providing the old vessel doesn't need removing (i.e. it's not leaking water), any plumber can fit a new expansion vessel outside of the boiler - doesn't need to be Gas Safe. You can do it yourself if you feel up to it.

If you said where you are, Geoff might know one of his Gas Safe customers in your area. However, as you've swiped their mark-up on parts, even they may be less inclined to do the work.

If I was designing a system for a rented home, I wouldn't use a single-point-of-failure gas boiler for the hot water. I have friends who rent out houses, and most of them have been badly stung this way, and their tenants without hot water for weeks in many cases.

A gas boiler and a hot water cylinder with immersion heater back-up would be fine.

Reply to
Andrew Gabriel

Now the last time I spoke to Geoff I was in Sheffield and a GasSafe installer was just about to install his 3rd brand new PCB into a boiler and wondering why the other two PCBs had blown.

It took Geoff 2 seconds to sort it:-)

Reply to
ARWadsworth

I can see why the 2nd/3rd/etc plumbers would be wary, but if the 1st plumber thought a £400 PCB would fix it, it's pretty damning that he doesn't want to fit a £50 PCB instead.

Reply to
Andy Burns

I suspect that *many* plumbers are greedy, and only want the lucrative jobs. But that doesn't apply to *all* plumbers.

The chap I use installed my boiler 20 years ago and, when I recently had a problem, was quite happy to come and strip it, and is now looking for 'obsolete' parts in order to restore it to full health and happiness. [He has restored it to relative health and happiness without any parts, but the problem may recur]. It was 2 or 3 weeks ago that he came, and I haven't had a bill yet. He has done other jobs for me in the meantime - such as installing UFH in my garage/kitchen conversion - and his charges have always been extremely reasonable.

Reply to
Roger Mills

More likely they want to maximise the profit on any job. Fitting parts bought by the owner doesn't allow them to conceal the profit they make on them.

There is no earthly reason a new PCB will be any better than a well repaired one. Possibly even worse.

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

I would agree with Alan all the way.

No way I would touch a job like that, especially from a landlord - just asking for grief.

Reply to
The Medway Handyman

These same plumbers, who then charge the full price for a new one no doubt ??

Andy C

Reply to
Andy Cap

Why shouldn't they make a profit on the parts?

Reply to
The Medway Handyman

Quite rightly too.

Reply to
The Medway Handyman

Why *should* they? I remember when serving my apprenticeship back in

1974 to 78, we had to take our union membership cards into the electrical wholesalers in order to get trade discount. Nowadays though, electrical wholesalers (round here at least) will sell stuff at the same price to both tradesmen and Joe Public so why should a tradesman put a markup on when Joe Public can get it themselves?
Reply to
Dave

..

Years ago I knew a guy who repaired washing machines. His attitude was much the same as the above: if he fixed a ten year old machine with a replacement motor/bearing/stat/controller etc there was a fair chance that something else would fail within a finite period and the owner would expect this to be fixed for free or be less than happy at incurring another bill. Pragmatism rather than a desire to scam people. But if someone thinks otherwise they could always market themselves as "don't spend thousands on a new boiler when we can probably fix it for a low price"

Reply to
Tony Bryer

None - but they generally conceal it. Explain why.

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

The mark up is simple. If the part I supplied fails then I replace it for free. It's £30 an hour (subject to a mimimum of 1 hours charge) to replace a customers supplied part that has failed.

Reply to
ARWadsworth

Because the tradesman knows exactly what to buy & where from.

You seem to be saying it's OK for wholesalers to earn a mark up, but not tradesmen?

Take for example the mortice latch mentioned in another post.

Homebase £6.49, B&Q £5.47. I buy them from Toolstation for 70p and charge customers £4 for them.

The customer, who wouldn't know what to buy anyway, hasn't had the inconvenience of going to buy one and has saved money anyway.

Reply to
The Medway Handyman

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