I paid for a gas safety check if the boiler in a property we are purchasing. I asked the engineer to arrange access with the estate agent and provided contact details.
A week later i contacted him to ask if he’d arranged this and he said he was going that day.
Later that day i get a partial refund-charging me £30 for a no show at the property. I call the estate agent and engineer to find out what happened and apparently the engineer told the estate agent at 10am that morning he would be there between 12 & 4 and to make sure someone was there. The tenants were out at this time and it was too short notice and so the estate agent didnt agree this.
I disputed the call out fee and explained i just wanted the gas safety check done and arranged properly with notice to the estate agent.
They arranged for Saturday, then the engineer didnt turn up and didnt communicate this when the tenants stayed in all day
The transaction this was refunded and i have now wasted two weeks and a lit of hassle because Openrent contractors can’t organise the a simple task of arranging a suitable time for a job with an estate agent. I won’t use them again.
LL, if I were you, I would get in touch with OR and privately let them know the name of a disgraced contractor. They may reconsider who they recommend.
organise your own engineer safer, better
this kind of thing is obviously going to happen if you don’t get involved yourself
I got involved myself in a number of ways;
- Booking the engineer via Openrent
- Providing contact details to the engineer once they had been assigned because surprisingly Openrent do not pass on the information written in the job request instructions.
- Checked back after 6 days to the engineer to ask if he had booked it (they don’t proactively tell you this as their customer).
- Called the engineer immediately when they refunded £15 of the £45 fee to find out why they had done this and then they said it was a no-show.
- Called the estate agent to get their side of events which is when they explained that the appt time had not been agreed
- Called the engineer back to explain the estate agents side of the events and find out what he was going to do about organising the job properly.
- Emailed openrent to dispute being charged the call out fee
- Spoke to the estate agent when the engineer didnt turn up two days later and apologise.
Result being all this is for nothing because i still do not have a gas safety certificate being done and have to engage someone outside Openrent which i should have done in the first place. I am sharing my experience so others don’t have to deal with their time wasters like I did.
My expectation that an engineer can speak with an estate agent and agree a mutually convenient date/time should not be beyond the wit of a man providing such a service.
book a woman gas engineer
This is exactly what we have done now! My sister has booked women tradespeople throughout the purchase process (surveyor, lawyer, broker, now plumber) and it seems to be serving her well!
Not an epc inspector, ladders scare them as I’ve just found out 
Only idiots turn up without an appointment.