HomeServe

[MikeCefn]

Has anyone else had problems with these guys? Below is a copy of the complaint I sent to their customer services department yesterday (26th December). It sums up the problem: apologies for the use of the S word but I'm pretty much at the end of my tether -

 

I have now been waiting since Tuesday 21st for your drainage engineer to call. I was first told Tuesday evening. Then I was told Wednesday, I waited all day and someone rang to say they were coming, no -one did. Then someone rang to say they would come on Thursday, no one did and then they rang at about 9pm to say they would call on Friday. On Friday someone rang at about 12 noon to say that the drainage engineer was on their way. As I hadn't been out of the house since Tuesday I asked when this would be. I was given the number 0800 0327590 and told to ring this directly. I did and they said I had no appointment and that I could only make one for Wednesday 29th! When I said that I had been waiting since Tueday and my house was now uninhabitable I was told that the engineer had removed me from the diary! Wouldn't it have been nice if you had informed me in the first place that you had no intention of coming? I have missed 3 days work and now you want to make me miss a 4th! What exactly are you going to do - is anyone going to call on Wednesday or are you just going to 'phone me to tell me you are coming on Thusday or Friday or possibly never? I want to know what time they are coming, not 'between 8 & 6' now I want a time. Youv'e ruined my Christmas - my family is distraught and had to move out. I've spent Christmas Day and Today carrying buckets of **** to pour down a neighbours drain, by Wednesday evening I'm going to arrange a drain clearance and charge it to your company, then you can discuss compensation with my solicitors who will be in touch after the new year. I hope your Christmas was every bit as good as mine!

[buzby]

Hope you calmed down! Afraid you cannot charge for anything and attempt to bill them in the hope of payment. This will require their express agreement, and you know you'll not get that. For their lack of service, you should at least get a refund/rebate and perhaps some compensation, and an apology why you were failled. Bearing in mind many thousants of people have plumbing issues caused by the extremes of temperature, it is not their fault it happened.

[MikeCefn]

Thanks Buzby,

 

Yes - I've come down off the ceiling now - they've actually been and sorted the matter. It took 10 minutes with a jet wash. But what really hacks me off is the 4 days I took off work and the lack of information and communication between different parts of the same organisation. If they had informed me in advance that they couldn't make it I could have taken advantage of the £500 accommodation alternative in the contract, but you try booking 2 hotel rooms in Llangollen on Xmas eve at 6 o'clock!!

 

I appreciate that they were probably overwhelmed, but a little more information to customers would have been good, especially since they claim to have an average of 2 hour call-out wait. 182 hours in my case, did they actually have a 91 fold increase in traffic? I doubt it.

 

Anyway, I have spoken to Consumer Direct and they think I have a case for 'damages to reflect a breach of contract'. The level of which to be agreed, or set by the Small Claims court. First job is to write to them outlining where I think they let me down and then waiting for a response.

 

In terms of the use of another contractor - Consumer Direct stated that under the circumstances I was entitled to give them a response deadline and then go for 3 quotes in order to keep the costs 'reasonable'. However - I would think that if your house is sinking under the weight of the brown steaming then any contractor would seem suitable as long as they were reputable.

 

However, I had to smile ironically; when the HomeServe van eventually arrived the drainage guy objected to crossing my garden because, after the snows had cleared it appears that the local cats have been using it as a sandbox in the bad weather. My problem with the substance was slightly worse!

[greigster]

Hope you calmed down! Afraid you cannot charge for anything and attempt to bill them in the hope of payment. This will require their express agreement, and you know you'll not get that. For their lack of service, you should at least get a refund/rebate and perhaps some compensation, and an apology why you were failled. Bearing in mind many thousants of people have plumbing issues caused by the extremes of temperature, it is not their fault it happened.

Which part of making appointments and not turning up 5 times would" not be their fault"

[buzby]

Which part of 'Sorry Guv, I've got another 8 jobs to go to and your past your allotted timeframe for this problem. Someone else will call later."

 

Either you've never worked in customer services 'in the field' or believe staff are permanently connected to their offices when jobs overrun? In my area, the team are allocated their jobs for the day before they leave the depot. Sometimes they have contact numbers, sometimes they don't and are supposed to call CS and tell them they're running late. Not many of them have a personal assistant to do this, as they're probably still trying to resolve an issue for someone further up the list.

 

To Mike, I'm afraid CD are playing fast and loose with you and their appraisal of the situation. You'll pay for raising the action, and possibly lose out if the judge does not agree with you. You would also have a hard time claiming breach of contract, as (a) they did turn up, and (b) you probably didn;t pay extra for a 'service guarantee'.

 

This is where you pay a premium and a guaranteed a response within X hours. If they don't turn up, you are then on a sliding scale of enhanced compensation. Without this there is no breach, and you would only be in the running for an ex-gracia rebate. or whatever HS deemed was appropriate.

 

This may be OK, derisory, or non-existant - but you can negotiate. If you bring the courts into it, you don't have a great case. and if you lose you have to pay their (capped) costs. Unless you don't mind the gamble, go for it. But as retribution for wasted days its a bad move as in the cold light of day in court, indignation goes out the window...

[greigster]

 

To Mike, I'm afraid CD are playing fast and loose with you and their appraisal of the situation. You'll pay for raising the action, and possibly lose out if the judge does not agree with you. You would also have a hard time claiming breach of contract, as (a) they did turn up, and (b) you probably didn;t pay extra for a 'service guarantee'.

 

But (a) they did not turn up on 5 occasions even though appointments had been made.

Now have I read the original post wrong?

[buzby]

An apology for dreadful customer service is certainly in order. For CD to suggest a breach is negligence in the extreme? The fact they DID turn up in the end mitigates their earlier failure, with no benefit if attempting to screw a settlement where no guarantees were provided.

[Honestly]

Unfortunately, I disagree with Busbys comments that you cannot expect Homeserve to reimburse any costs. I recently had the same problem and I appreciate that Homeserve may have had an overwhelming amount of claims considering the weather. This is not your problem - you pay for a service and the consumer expects.

 

I will be receiving my reimbursement of circa £200 along with compensation as the business has quite rightly admitted that inconvenience was caused and the service was below expectation, you also have grounds for compensation. This will be reinforced by regulation, I know this as my daughter had taken a similar matter to the Financial Ombudsman Service for 2 missed appointments for a burst pipe issue at the property. The argument was that an 'Emergency' was present and causing damage a key point of the contract. Whilst it may have been that the problem was isolated, 5 days without water deemed the business liable for still creating an emergency at the property, being unable to use the toilet and drinking water. Thankfully, the Ombudsman service found in favour and she received a total costing of £800. (this took into account the hotel allowance, which was never offered) What you need to do is measure the level of inconvenience and distress the whole matter may have caused. A generic apology without any formal investigation is usually sent by businesses as I can guess the complaint levels there will be very high. Companies gamble on the fact that an apology will deter you from proceeding with a complaint further and dare I say it the consumer can often be ignorant to the principles of 'Treating Customers Fairly'. the key is to be patient with your response in order to find what is fair.

 

what response have you had?

[buzby]

Being treated 'fairly' is an aspiration - not a legal requirement. My point is, if - after exhausting an informal process to achieve compensation the firm does not agree and cites external situations preventing normal service, means your only resort left is to the courts, and hear a 'win' is not guaranteed. Just as snow ia not the problem of the bus company, train drivers, courier firms and the like - only a fool would believe that this is of little consequence, he paid for a service and if he doesn't get it, there will be trouble. As it stands, they DID turn out and do work - later than their promise - but they did do the work. Making a claim of non-compliance dead in the water.

[BankFodder]

I'm amazed that the advice that you receiving here from Buzby. It is completely incorrect and encourages minimal standards from customer customer service companies.

 

Consumer Direct is absolutely correct. By making an appointment with you, Homeserve are contractually obliged to keep the appointment with you – and given all reasonable circumstances, to carry out the job for you. Each time they repeated the appointment, they were contractually obliged to attend. Breaking appointment amounts to breach-of-contract. It is absolutely reasonably foreseeable that you might have to take time off to keep the appointment and that you might have suffered some loss as a result. You are entitled to recover the value of that loss – but you would have to be to demonstrate to the court. So if you have had to take time off work, or if you have lost holiday entitlement, then all of this would be recoverable. In addition, if you are able to argue cogently that you have suffered some particular specifiable loss as a result of their failure to remedy the problem at an early stage, then I expect that this would be recoverable as well.

 

The fact that the customer service department might be overrun at that particular time of year is their particular problem. Either they should invest more, or they should take on less and not make all the appointments that they would like to make. It is clear to me that your case has been very badly handled by them and I would send them one letter outlining all your losses and if they don't respond within seven days and I would sue them.

 

If you want some help suing them then start a separate thread