In July 2001 our old boiler failed. We
met with a technical advisor (e.g.salesman) from British Gas who
sold us a new “package” to include boiler, fitting and
labour. B.G. assured us that the inflated price of this “package”
was because we would receive excellent service.
We were told that the job would take 3 days. In fact it took over
a fortnight during which time we had to make numerous phone calls
to get the process to continue.
An electrician drilled through one of the water pipes and also
mis-wired the system so that it did not work. The primary system
leaked and it took three visits, several phone calls and more
than a week to get this fixed.
Bricks were required to repair the hole in the outside wall left
by the removal of the previous system. These should have been
delivered with the boiler, but were not. Eventually one of the
fitters had to go to a nearby town to get bricks.
We lost count of the number of visits but it was more than ten
and about as many different individual fitters, none of whom knew
what the previous ones had done. We had to wait in for each of
these visits and British Gas “were unable” to arrange
precise times so we were greatly inconvenienced.
For nine months British Gas refused to acknowledge our complaints
at this poor service, let alone address them, despite about a
dozen letters, as many emails and countless telephone calls to
the “Customer Relations” department ( this name is a
sick joke as the concept of customer relations escapes British
Gas). They have finally written us a series of letters, each of
which claims that their inflated prices reflect the high standard
of service that they offer, but none of which addresses the fact
that they failed to deliver an even adequate service to us.
There has been no hint of an apology and the last letter was frankly
insulting.
Like your other complainants we have found it impossible to get
through the telephone answering system to anyone capable of understanding
our problems and it is clear that this failure is due to deliberate
British Gas policy. We have been left feeling conned and frustrated
and bullied – something which we resent thoroughly. Until
we found this website we felt singled - out for this appalling
treatment, but we can only assume that it reflects British Gas
policy and the contempt in which they hold their clients.
Link to Other British
Gas Complaints
