I recently bought a Royal 400 Solo Gas Fire from warmorwet.com (Thermagas Ltd). When my Gas Safe engineer came to do the installation it became clear that the fire was faulty. He diagnosed it as a faulty gas valve. I suppose I should have then smelled a rat when I contacted Thermagas to report the fault, as they said they were not responsible and directed me to the Sirocco Fires (the manufacturer) premium rate support line, which charges £1 per minute! Eventually however, after I said I was not prepared to pay for a premium rate telephone call, and that it was their responsibility to resolve the problem, they agreed to call the company themselves. A couple of days later I got a call back from a Sirocco engineer, who said that he could not come out for at least two weeks, but doubted that it was the gas valve. He said it was most likely an electrical fault and said he would send out the relevant part, which turned out to be a battery box. Please remember that this diagnosis was done on the telephone without looking at the fire, and totally went against what my Gas Safe engineer had diagnosed from a full inspection! When the part arrived I called my gas engineer back, and again, nothing worked. His view was that they had just sent the cheapest part in the hope that it would "do the job" and save them having to come out and properly diagnose what was wrong. I contacted the retailer and manufacturer again by email, and eventually the Sirocco engineer rang again. This time he said that he would order a full "tray", and when it arrived he would arrange to visit. I asked that he contact me with an update, as I did not want to allow the issue to drag on too long. Two weeks passed by, and no call. I then rang and left a message with the engineer (no reply), and also contacted Thermagas by email. After a second email I got a promise that a message had been sent to Sirocco asking them to get in touch. This morning I had an email from Arthur Wright, CEO of Sirocco, with an address in Poland. The email said that the parts were out of stock, and I would have to wait for at least a month before the parts would arrive in Poland from Italy, and then be sent to the engineer. He also had the nerve to suggest that I would have to give them my Credit/Debit card number!! I would warn anyone about buying this type of fire (or indeed any Sirocco fire) as clearly if you have a breakdown it is possible that parts will have to be sourced from Italy via Poland. I could understand it if the gas fire was old, but this model is available from numerous suppliers. I would also suggest that for Thermagas to direct its customers to a £1 per minute premium rate telephone number, rather than seek to resolve issues themselves, cannot be said to offer good customer service. The item was faulty when supplied, and I have to say that Thermagas Ltd (trading as Warm or Wet, Leigh St, Chorley) have tried every trick in the book to deflect me from my rights under the Sale of Goods Act 1979 (as amended). I have no doubt that they have a stock of these gas fires from which they could obtain the required part, and could easily have arranged to get an engineer to visit and resolve the matter during the last month. Instead, I have been played between retailer and manufacturer. I have now formally rejected the gas fire, and advised them that I want the matter resolving this week. I will update as things develop. It is worth adding that this has been going on throughout the coldest March on record.

PLEASE READ & PASS ON – IMPORTANT Insurance is a wonderful thing when it works, but read the cause of this fire - you may be surprised. Please pass this one along to your family and friends. House fires - please read The original message was written by a lady whose brother and wife learned a hard lesson this past week. Their house burnt down.. nothing left but ashes. They have good insurance so the house will be replaced and most of the contents. That is the good news. However, they were sick when they found out the cause of the fire. The insurance investigator sifted through the ashes for several hours.. He had the cause of the fire traced to the master bathroom. He asked her sister-in-law what she had plugged in the bathroom. She listed the normal things...curling iron, blow dryer. He kept saying to her, 'No, this would be something that would disintegrate at high temperatures'.. Then her sister-in-lawremembered she had a Plug-In, in the bathroom. The investigator had one of those 'Aha' moments. He said that was the cause of the fire. He said he has seen more house fires started with the plug-in type room fresheners than anything else. He said the plastic they are made from is THIN. He also said that in every case there was nothing left to prove that it even existed. When the investigator looked in the wall plug, the two prongs left from the plug-in were still in there. Her sister-in-law had one of the plug-ins that had a small night light built in it. She said she had noticed that the light would dim and then finally go out. She would walk in to the bathroom a few hours later, and the light would be back on again.. The investigator said that the unit was getting too hot, and would dim and go out rather than just blow the light bulb. Once it cooled down it would come back on. That is a warning sign The investigator said he personally wouldn't have any type of plug in fragrance device anywhere in his house. He has seen too many places that have been burned down due to them. PLEASE PASS THIS ON TO ALL THE PEOPLE IN YOUR ADDRESS BOOK.. NOT ONLY COULD IT SAVE SOMEONE'S HOUSE, BUT IT COULD SAVE SOMEONE'S LIFE