British Gas Homecare

[alan30]

My daughter has a contract with British Gas (BG) that covers plumbing and drains. Last year she called out the service man who turned out to be a sub contractor to BG. The problem was a leak between the water inlet pipe and the toilet bowl. He repaired it then stated that the problem was the pipe was too short where it came out of the wall and therefore was a design fault and was not covered under the policy. He said BG would exclude further visits and notify my daughter. The pipe is leaking again and my daughter feels there is no point ringing BG due the exclusion. My view is that BG state they make checks every 2 years and to date 5 years in have made none. If the pipe is short it should have been picked up in the initial inspection. Equally in repairing the leak the first time surely BG have accepted it falls under the terms of the policy? Failure to write and confirm a specific exclusion based on a sub contractors comment also doesn't help their case? Any views?

[Law Man1856]

BG do sub contract to plumbers and electrical contractors in the area local to customers houses. The legal argument is "fitness for purpose" and if the leak did not happen until 5 years after the item was fitted any warranty from the installer or manufactuer has expired.

BG have a duty to rectify the leak under the contract but not to rectify design problems.

Specific clauses will be written in to the BG contract to protect BG from design problems.

I have recently had 8 months of trying to get my bolier fixed with BG finally replacing the right part.

However back to your question, BG will need to clarify the specific exclusion in writing - Citizens advice will help you progress your claim if they don't comply.

Best of luck

[The Mack]

moan like hell.