So two days ago, I get back from dropping the kids off at school to find that there's a large wet stain on the ceiling of the hall. The carpet in the bottom of the boiler cupboard is sodden.
Conclusion: the boiler is leaking.
I ring the letting agency. Jessica is very friendly and helpful and a little while later I get a call from a service company. Their man will call later that day. Result
But...
It turns out that their man ins only a plumber and is not CORGI registered and can't work on gas boilers. So he needs to escalate it to a heating engineer. He does this at ~3pm two days ago, saying (to me) that someone should phone me to arrange a time for the engineer to call. I pass this on to Jessica.
After a couple of hours, no phone call. So Jessica chases them. Nothing.The next morning, I let Jessica know that I've heard nothing, and she chases again. A little later I get a phone call from a guy from another service company. He tells me that they'll send someone "tomorrow" (i.e. today). Given that we're had no heating for more than 24 hours now, I ask if there's any chance of it being the same day (yesterday) He very officiously tells me that they guarantee a next day call out service and they only got the fax this morning, and the engineer will phone me between 8-8:30 to arrange a time to call.
Conclusions:
Remember us tenants are the lowest form of life, the agent rips us and the landlord off, the landlord rips us off, the bank rips the landlord off, we bail the bank out (or the bank rips us off)...
I'm not being cynical or anything but why should the landlord install proper reliable and economic appliances when they can install the cheapest cr*p, and we are forced to pay the utility bill and take time off from work when it breaks.
If it weren't for the insanity of UK property prices I'd have bought a house by now, even though I like the flexibility of renting, because most landlords and their agents are ar*e holes...!
