DANGER OF THE WEEK AWARD
Bad ‘Business Owners’
Regulations broken: BS7671:2008

It’s the time of year when boilers get switched on after a long break. It’s good practice to get your boiler serviced sometime before it needs to be switched on to make sure it’s safe. What is safe? Safe can mean a few things more than just the boiler itself. It relates to the room the boiler lives in, the air vents if required that allow the boiler to burn and dispose of the products of combustion properly and many other factors that you the end user may not fully understand. Here’s a good example of what could happen when you don’t service or inspect your boiler regularly.

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DANGER OF THE WEEK AWARD
Bad ‘Electricians’
Regulations broken: BS7671:2008

You may have never heard of a Marrette or Marr connector and I was surprised as anyone to see one in a job to remove a fluorescent light fixture. As an ex-Canadian I’ve used hundreds and have seen thousands of Marrettes over the years…but never in the UK.

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DANGER OF THE WEEK AWARD
Bad ‘DIY Property Maintenance ‘

It’s getting on to the end of the year. No Really! If you don’t believe me take a walk through your town centre. Christmas sales and decorate remind us that the cold weather is coming. My interest in the seasonal change however is safety. The big burning ball of mostly hydrogen called the sun is around in shorter supply every day. Especially here in Oldham. Your heating systems and fires are starting to get turned onto supplement.  If you haven’t had your fire or boiler serviced recently here’s at least one good reason why you should. continue

DANGER OF THE WEEK AWARD
Bad Plumbers

The delivery driver who was also going to hook up the new washer and take away the old had to abandon his idea. He was unable to locate the washing machine valves in order to turn off the water.  It was the old hidden hose trick! continue

DANGER OF THE WEEK AWARD
Bad Builders

Firstly, my apologies for not posting last weeks award  until today. It seems that I didn’t press the Publish button last week.

This particular property has been winning awards for poor workmanship for over a year. We keep getting called back in for one problem, get it sorted, and then several months later get called in for something else. This week was another  issue with the central heating system and another wet patch showing up on the ceiling. There may also be a hive of bees in the flat roof too! continue

DANGER OF THE WEEK AWARD
Bad Electricians

Another week and yet another electrical issue located during a Periodic Inspection.  This is the kind of issue we see on  regular basis. When we removed the oven to test the cooker circuit we found two connections to a single spur which under certain circumstances would be correct. Under this circumstance however all is not good, correct or safe. continue

DANGER OF THE WEEK AWARD
Bad Landlord Planning

We’ve already  highlighted  Landlord Licensing Schemes on several occasions. Our aim in those articles was to highlight other contractors unsafe or poor working practices. An interesting pattern has emerged as we undertake more of these checks on our landlord’s behalf. The pattern is that we are always the last people called in. The assumption by the property owner seems to be that because everything appears to work there should be no issue. That is the wrong assumption and it could end up costing you cold hard cash! continue