British Gas Central Heating Installations-What a Rip Off! (British Gas)

Name: Lucille

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Product:	British Gas
Date:	23/10/00 (1208 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: None

Disadvantages: Expensive. Rip off for parts as well as labour

We moved into our new home in August. It has gas central heating, so decided to cover it with British Gas' Three Star Cover Plan. Basically this means that if the boiler or radiators break down, British Gas will come out and fix them. Before you can go onto the plan, you have to have your heating system inspected, which is understandable. A man came down, inspected the heating, and said that everything was fine except for two radiators and two valves, (this of course, it a problem with buying a house in the summer, you don't know if the heating is working correctly). He said that these would have to be replaced before they would cover the system. Fine, we decided to get them replaced.
I rang the sales department of British Gas to find out how much they would charge to do the work. They were very keen to come down. I rang on a Friday afternoon, and they came first thing on Monday morning. All the time he was looking at the radiators the guy was saying-"nice small job this" and "should be able to do you a cheap price for this", all things I wanted to hear. Then he gave me the estimate;£371, I was amazed. If that's cheap, I would hate to see expensive. The quote include £118 for just one radiator, it is quite long, but not very tall. He also tried to railroad me into booking an appointment straight away. I used the excuse of my husband needing to see the quote, and he left.
Later, we decided to do some ringing around to find out just how expensive British Gas was. My husband found a small heating shop where all the parts needed came to only £130, only slight more than British Gas would charge for one radiator. I am not surprised that their labour charge was expensive, I sort of expected that, but when they are ripping you off for the parts as well, it's not on.
We have decided to do the work ourselves, (so look out for my next opinion, what brings water marks out of carpets when your heating systems floods!). But that'
;s only because my husband is practical and doesn't mind doing things like this. British Gas are making excessive profits at the expense of people who haven't got the time or ability to do the work. I would never ask for a quote from them again for anything to do with our heating system.




***********Update**********


Today (28th October) my husband fitted the new radiators, without any major disasters. We think we have probably spent about another £30 on bits and pieces to do the job, so in all it's probably cost about £160. That's still £211 cheaper than British Gas.

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