Is BG Power Flush necessary?

[littlewren]

Hello,

 

Please excuse this long post.

 

I had British Gas out on the 1st October this year to do their annual boiler/maintenance check. The system is nearly 26 years old and I was worried in case the boiler failed the tests. The engineer did his checks, including a room test (apparently a new thing they do) turned on the central heating and left saying that everything was fine. He left me the checklist which has everything ticked ok and a comment that said: ASV. ROOM TEST. ALL OK.

 

Then, 2 days ago (29 days after the maintenance check) I received a phone call from a woman at British Gas who told me the engineer had made a note that I needed a power flush to my system and that it would cost between £500-700 but that I could have a Corgi registered person to do it for slightly cheaper. I listened to her and told her I couldn't afford anything like that at the moment. She told me that if I didn't have one before my annual maintenance agreement was up for renewal, then although British Gas would come out to me if I had a problem with the central heating, I would have to foot the bill and my direct debit payments would be reduced to take this into account. I asked when my renewal was and she told me the 24th November!

 

I stumbled and stuttered my way through the rest of the conversation, asking her: 'so if my central heating broke down on, say, the 25th November, you would fix it but send me the bill.' She said yes.

 

I told her again that I knew nothing about this and that the engineer hadn't mentioned anything at all to me about a power flush, but she just repeated that I won't be covered in future.

 

I then phoned British Gas, got a very rude man who sullenly told me he wasn't an engineer and couldn't help me and with a yawn asked me did I want to make a complaint? I told him no, I just wanted to know why I wasn't told about this at the time. He said he'd get someone to call me that afternoon, no call came.

 

I phoned again half an hour later, hoping to get someone more helpful, which I did and he told me he would get someone to look into it for me and phone me back as soon as possible.

 

Yesterday, no call had come so I phoned again around 3pm, this time a woman answered and when I told her I was still waiting for a call back, she told me someone had tried to ring me at 1.50pm. I told her no-one had tried to ring me, I had been in all day and hadn't used my phone at all. She told me she would get the woman 'who tried' to ring me urgently. Still no call.

 

So here I am, 2 days later, worried sick and wondering where on earth I can find anything up to £500-£700. Even half of that I can't afford at the moment.

 

I can't find anything in the small print that mentions anything like this - but I bet I've missed it.

 

Can someone please advise as to what they would do in my circumstance?

I just don't have the money to pay for a power flush at the moment.

 

Many thanks in advance,

 

Carrie

[slick132]

Hi LittleWren and welcome to CAG.

 

I know Bigmac will be informed of your post and hopefully stop by and comment.

 

Can you please say if your system seems to be running all as normal.

 

In particular, are all your radiators (rads) heating right across the panel or do some rads have colder spots.

 

Have you had anything from BG in writing about this. If so, what specifically has been said about Power Flushing.

[littlewren]

Hello slick and thankyou for your reply.

 

The only trouble we have - and we have had this for years and years and were told it was the way the pipes were designed - is that we need to bleed the bathroom radiator occasionally. This one is right next to the airing cupboard.

 

The cold spot is at the top of the bathroom radiator - halfway up and is fine once bled. There isn't the normal 'arc' that I've been reading about.

 

The system - touch wood - is running fine, we haven't had any problems.

 

No, I haven't had anything in writing from British Gas and as I say, the checklist they left doesn't mention anything about a power flush. The engineer didn't even put my name at the top!

 

Carrie

[slick132]

Well, for starters, they'd HAVE to put any system requirement in writing before they can change the terms of your contract. Until that's done, I doubt you have to even worry about this.

 

Please confirm how many rooms you have on the system.

 

Big Mac will look in, I'm sure, as he'll get a nudge that someone's posted here. He may be able to advise if you have any way to argue with BG's requiremnt to Power Flush.

[littlewren]

Hi again slick.

 

We have four bedrooms, lounge, kitchen, bathroom, dining room, cloakroom, and of course the landing has a radiator too, 11 in total.

 

I forgot to say that the first woman I spoke to said the engineer said there was a blockage in the system. Well, he said nothing to me about a blockage of any kind, he told me everything was fine.

 

Thankyou in advance for any more advice or suggestions you can offer.

 

Carrie

[littlewren]

By the way, call me suspicious, but a couple of months ago I had British Gas out to have a look at my fridge/freezer. It wasn't broken, but making a bit of a noise from the freezer. The engineer said that even though it was frost-free it needed defrosting occasionally and that there was probably a little bit of ice caught every now and then around the fan.

 

He told me to defrost it, which I said I would do and then he said he might as well do it with a hairdryer while he was here. He spent a while with the hairdryer, telling me I couldn't do it as you had to be careful with the sensors.

 

When he was about to go, he said he would ring me to make sure it was working again ok. He never rang and over the weekend the temperature fluctuated dramatically, the buzzer kept going off and I had to have another engineer out a week later. He tested the freezer with his temperature gauge and told me that it was nowhere near the temperature it was meant to be and he could see it was going quickly from 0 degrees to -20 and back again. He said the first engineer had damaged the sensor and the upshot was that British Gas paid me £360 for a new fridge/freezer (the original cost me £470 but they wouldn't give me that much as it was five years old, albeit working fine).

 

Secondly, I changed energy suppliers when all the energy companies were starting to raise their prices about two months ago and went for a capped price with Scottish Gas.

 

As I say, call me suspicious, but I find it a bit strange that this call about power flushing the system has come out of the blue after all these years and also with no note left with me about having one done.

 

A way of British Gas recouping their £360?

 

Carrie

[slick132]

Hi Carrie,

 

If you've read the earlier posts on here, you'll see BigMac confirmed that the BG engineers get paid a bonus for PFlush work and (I think) anything else which is not covered by their contract such as new boiler, rads, etc.

 

I know I'm cynical, but surely the engineer would have said something to you about this blockage. Why not ask BG for sight of the eng'rs actual report, or an exact copy of it, so you can decide how to deal with the alleged problem.

 

I'll leave it now for BigMac to drop by and comment generally and maybe specifically about the cost of a PF on a system of this size.

[littlewren]

Thankyou very much slick and I await Big Mac's reply too.

 

I would say though, that although British Gas will possibly let me see the report, it mentions nothing on my report at all about a power flush. Looking at the checklist, the boxes that say 'Appliance is safe and working correctly' 'Programmer/timer and all controls working correctly' etc. are all ticked 'yes.'

 

So even though his report will of course mention a power flush, which is why the woman rang me, it still wasn't mentioned to me at the time nor mentioned on my report.

 

Carrie

[Bigmac versus]

Thx Slick for shouting me.

Hi littlewren its not unusual for BG to recommend a PF the question is does the system need this to be done.

 

There are checks which would help reach that answer one which slick has touched on regarding cold spots on rads.

 

Did this engineer do any of the following?

 

Check all rads for cold spots and air.

Check the F & E tank (small tank which fills the system usually in the attic)

Check the connection of the feed pipe to the system usually at the hot water tank.

 

These are basic checks to determine if the system is fouled up and without doing these amongst others it is foolish to advise a PF.

 

By your own admission the only problem you know of is the bathroom radiator which requires bleeding quite often.

 

This is more than likely down to Oxide forming in the radiator creating air

and can be easily rectified by removing it and flushing out, in the extreme case renewing that radiator would solve the problem which would be a lot less than a PF especially as bathroom rads arent usually that big.

 

How long did the engineer spend in your house that day and where did he go to do his checks?

[Bigmac versus]

Sound like there are no chokes in the system only a radiator which should be removed and flushed or replaced.

[littlewren]

Hi Bigmac and thankyou very much for your reply. Thanks to slick too for shouting Bigmac!

 

In answer to your questions, no the engineer didn't check the radiators for cold spots or air. He asked me if there were any problems, did the maintenance of the boiler, went to the airing cupboard and switched on the heating (at this point, as he went upstairs on his own I don't know if he felt the landing radiator as he passed, but he didn't go into any of the bedrooms nor any other rooms downstairs. He came down from turning on the heating within a couple of minutes).

 

He didn't go into the loft at all, no.

 

I don't know if he checked the connection of the feed pipe to the system if that's in the airing cupboard.

 

The engineer took about half an hour with the boiler maintenance as he had to do a room check too - which he said it passed. Another few minutes was spent when he went upstairs to the airing cupboard to switch on the heating.

 

The only places he did the checks were in the kitchen for the boiler, which he said was fine and then, as I say, he went upstairs for a few minutes to the airing cupboard.

 

When he had finished and was about to go, he ticked the various boxes on the checklist, said everything was fine and went.

 

It was only when I got this call three weeks later from a woman at British Gas that she told me the engineer said there was a blockage in the system and it needed a power wash within about 3 weeks to fit in with the renewal of my service contract. He had mentioned nothing to me - although he can always say that he did, of course - and absolutely nothing was mentioned on my checklist. My Dad said that B. Gas will get round this by saying it was just an error on the engineer's part, but why did he tell me everything was fine when he left?

 

I am worried sick as I don't know where I'm going to find this money.

 

I understand that as the system is 25 years old that one day I will have to have a power flush anyway, but I didn't think I would have just 3 weeks to come up with between £500-£700!

 

Many thanks Bigmac for any further advice.

 

Carrie

[Bigmac versus]

Just because the system is aged dosent mean it must have a PF, many systems manage fine without it. I would suggest you write to BG asking why it was decided that your system required these works and wait until you have their answer before deciding what to do next.

 

Your system sounds ok by what youve told me so it will be interesting to see what they come up with.

Also 30 mins to service an appliance is pretty quick what is the make of your boiler?

[littlewren]

Hi,

 

The boiler is a Potterton Netaheat.

[Bigmac versus]

Ok its a wall mount boiler, can you tell me what number after netaheat like 10-16 etc etc

[littlewren]

Hi Bigmac, it's a 10-16.

[slick132]

Thanks for looking in BigM,

 

Sounds to me like the follow-up call was more than likely speculative, hoping to scare Little Wren into an expensive PF.

 

I'd be asking for clear proof that the same engineer who visited recommended the PF as part of the report. Clearly no mention was made of any blockage or problem at the time of the visit.

 

I smell (a very expensive) rat !!

 

I'm moving these posts into L Wrens own thread for this topic.

[littlewren]

Thankyou for moving the post to a new thread slick. This forum's so helpful, I'm glad I found it.

[Bigmac versus]

Right

[Bigmac versus]

Ok the 10-16 mark1 is an old boiler but is a fairly reliable sort, there are a few issues with them though.

 

Im sure some of the parts are obsolete and hard to source as you can only get whats left on counters these days. Some of the older ones also contained asbestos. These boilers need serviced at least once a year due to the possibilities of the seal becoming distorted, this can happen due to a delayed igition (relay) whooosh creats a small explosion inside upon ignition which has in the past been involved in one fatality when flue gasses leaked out.

 

Im not tryig to scare you just make you aware of the boiler you have and the importance of having the boiler serviced fully.

 

I wouldnt pay for a PF, just wait until they answer your letter and we will discuss it further.

[Bigmac versus]

With this type of boiler I would advice you to have a carbon monoxide alarm this is due to the type of pressure (positive) within the heat exchanger.

[littlewren]

Oh crikey, that's awful. I do have it serviced as regular as clockwork every year though, and the engineer would check for a distorted seal, wouldn't he - hopefully?

 

I will do as you say and write to them and will report back when (if) I get a reply.

 

Do you think I should write to the customer services department or the complaints department?

 

Thankyou very much by the way, for all your help, I really appreciate it.

[littlewren]

It's funny you should mention a carbon monoxide detector, I bought one a few weeks ago but it's still sitting in the box. That's because I don't know where to site it! It says not to put it in the kitchen, which is where I would have thought would be the obvious position for it and the instruction leaflet is several pages long (with small writing!) It's a First Defence one.

 

Whereabouts should I sit it? I can't put it on the ceiling or in the wall as I am not confident enough to start drilling (knowing me, I'd drill through a pipe and have another problem on my hands!)

 

It would have to go on a shelf, but where is the best place please?

[Bigmac versus]

Yes they should check the seal BUT it would be better if you were there and happened to say to the engineer "how is the seal" it will alert them that you are aware of the situation and in turn should prevent them from taking any shortcuts whilst servicing (it does happen)

 

Do you have an alarm?

 

Customer services asking them for a detailed explanation as to why your system needs a PF, you need to know what they have found for reaching this decision, its not good enough to simply say its choked you want to know how they know its choked, what tests did they do to find this out etc.

If you get no joy or an unsatisfactory response then it would be complaints department.

[littlewren]

Thanks Bigmac, the thing is I can't ask about the seal now as the service has been carried out.

 

Yes I have a First Alert carbon monoxide alarm.

[Bigmac versus]

A great way of checking this yourself is when the boiler is on go around the seal to see if you can feel a draughtl, with the alarm your pretty much covered.