Hi,Often plumbers are portrayed on television as being robbers and I aminclined to agree.I let out the house where I used to live. You may remember me recentlysaying the tenant had no hot water. The plumber said it needed a newexpansion vessel and a new PCB. he claimed this was an uneconomicalrepair, he said it would cost £400 to repair it but recommendedspending twice as much to replace the boiler. I can't see how thatmakes the repair uneconomic when it is less than half the cost of anew boiler.The advice here was to make the repairs. Geoff told me he could supplya reconditioned PCB for £50. The plumber has gone AWOL. It seems to mehe lost interest when I did not want to pay for a new boiler. My poortenant is still without hot water.I'm guessing only a gas safe registered person can fit the PCB as itinvolves opening the boiler in a rented house?I typed the postcode into the gas safe web site and emailed all thelocal plumbers. The first plumber to reply said: "I don't deal with reconditionedparts even if they have a warranty". He then said he would wantpayment up front "because I don't know you... Sorry about this but Ilive and learn!". I felt tempted to reply "I am not paying you upfront because I don't know you!" What's to stop him running off withmy money without doing the work?Second plumber said: "Unfortunately we do not carry out repairs toboilers we only carry out full systems or boiler replacements. This isdue to experience, we have replaced certain parts on boilers in thepast but once a boiler starts to fail it is inevitable at some pointthat it will fail completely and it is then seen as our fault for notrecommending this.In my opinion I feel that a new boiler would be the best course ofaction 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 theyare worn, I must buy a new car? What a load of nonsense!Third plumber said: "[company name]...

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.

gas safe plumbers: greedy and unethical?

Jul 15, 2012 124 Replies

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geoff 13 years ago

That would be a Solo 2 I presume from your description

half a dozen neons in a row

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Dave Plowman (News) 13 years ago

Many modern boilers have an oxygen sensor in the exhaust. Don't see how that can work without a processor.

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Dave Plowman (News) 13 years ago

None whatsoever. I'll continue to do my own fault finding. ;-)

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Andy Wade 13 years ago

No, Bahama 100 (combi), GC no. 47-075-02.

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Mark Evans 13 years ago

The issue here is who's buying it rather than the price they pay. Otherwise everything would be sold Buy One Get One Free with anything faulty just happening to be "free" :)

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