boiler cover Who?

Magic_x_uk

Magic_x_uk

Magic_x_uk

Soldato
Joined
11 Oct 2005
Posts
5,717
Location
Derbyshire
Hi, thinking of having boiler cover, just wondered what companies are worth looking at?

We have a combi boiler, if that makes any difference, It is about 5 years old now.

Thanks
 
Homeserve and Bg. Switch every year with a month over lap to beat the price increase and save. New customer deals with both are excellent, about half price.
 
British Gas here, never had any issues with them. Always come out very quickly, never an issue with parts etc. They're cheap enough not to worry about switching between them and others, plus heard bad things about others such as Homeserve.
 
I have BG and it costs about £17 pm (excludes electrical issues but I'd fix those) and they charge a £50 flat fee per call out. So that's £254 per year with one call out priced in. A 'free' boiler service is included in the deal, say £80, so it's either spend the £174 py for cover and peace of mind, or bank it ready for when any issues arise.

I wasn't overly impressed with BG last week when our boiler refused to start up at 6:30 in the morning. The soonest they could get out was 24hrs later. We had no heating in that time and a 10 month old to keep warm. Thankfully we have a hot water tank with an immersion heater (burn those ££) so we had hot water at least. I like to think those more needy and vulnerable were seen to first and I'm happy with that.

Their engineers are great though, just don't mention 'powerflush' :).
 
koolpc said:
Unless of course the repair is not an average one!!!
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Of course but it could very well not break down at all either.

These insurances wouldn't be around if they didn't make money. The premiums exceed the cost. If they didn't the premiums would go up. The only real winner is the insurance company.

Yes my mate dave also had his whole system replaced seventeen times and each time they put him up in a five star hotel and gave him compo.
 
Maccapacca said:
Of course but it could very well not break down at all either.

These insurances wouldn't be around if they didn't make money. The premiums exceed the cost. If they didn't the premiums would go up. The only real winner is the insurance company.

Yes my mate dave also had his whole system replaced seventeen times and each time they put him up in a five star hotel and gave him compo.
Click to expand...

Used BG cover for years and it has been a God send! So glad we have the cover! What we have paid out over the years is nothing compared to what we have saved if we hadn't!!
 
I took out British Gas care, not their biggest package though.

They have been out twice in 18 months. Both times I rang really early in the morning and they came and fixed it the very same day and the last time was just after noon.

I pay roughly £24 per month.
 
We have BG cover with £50 excess. I have recently had to call them out to fix our heating as the 3 port valve kept sticking. The first time the engineer just said he had unstuck the valve and when I had to call them back out again afew months later for the same fault, the engineer made out it was a different part that was faulty to make sure they got paid the £50 excess.

When I had my boiler and rads replaced by a local plumber, he changed the 3 port valve and said they probably just got a pair of pliers and wiggled the top of the valve to free it up.

So they are ok but will do the minimum required to get your heating working.
 
^ Well that's the perfect solution but BG should not charge any excess for 12 months if the fault is with the same part.
 
cyber69 said:
So they are ok but will do the minimum required to get your heating working.
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This is the nature of the beast unfortunately, the business model demands they come out and get the boiler working as fast as possible then leg it to the next job.

Last British gas guy to repair our boiler used the pressure relief valve to de pressurise the boiler so he could swap a sensor then was surprised when I called him back later the same day to swap the pressure release valve as it hadn't resealed which is so common it's unbelievable!
 
He was taking a gamble there, which didn't pay off. Any service and repair person worth their salt should know that. But like you say, when productivity targets are so high on the agenda things like that are more likely to happen. It shouldn't, but it does.

I don't currently have an active policy, but have been with BG Homeserve for several years and always found them to be quick, polite and thoroughly professional. I've called them out to my Vokera boiler several times since moving in 3 years ago. I'm tempted to 'self-insure', but it feels too risky with my boilers history and winter approaching. (Plus I now get a 25% employee discount :D .)
 
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