Council Property Repairs

Water leaks

• Turn off the water at the stop tap 
• Drain down by turning your taps on
• Turn the central heating boiler off

Hot water or heating problems

There could be a number of reasons why your central heating or hot water system is not working.

You may be able to fix several problems yourself, which could avoid the need for an engineer visit.

1. Check that the gas/oil, electrical and water supplies to the heating appliance are turned on. It’s surprising how easily they can get accidentally switched off.
2. Check that you have sufficient credit in your gas and electric card meters.
3. Are other gas appliances affected? If so the problem is bigger, you will need to contact us, so that we can then make a mutually convenient appointment for an engineer to attend.
4. Check that the room thermostat is turned up and the clock timer/programmer is switched on.
5. Have you got a system with a permanent pilot light? Check that it hasn’t gone out - this is a very common problem with older gas appliances.
6. Check your boiler thermostat is turned up.
7. Have the clocks gone forward or back? Your clock programmer might just need adjusting to the correct time.
8. Has there been a power cut recently? Your heating clock programmer may have returned to its factory settings when the power came back on. Reset your programmer to your preferred settings.
9. Do you have a reset switch on your boiler that you can access without removing the casing? These are usually found on the front of modern boilers. Please check your appliance user manual to see if it needs resetting.
10. Try turning the electrical supply to the boiler off and on - the switch is usually near the boiler or in the airing cupboard. This might reset your boiler and resolve the problem.
11. Some heating systems with a hot water cylinder may also have an immersion heater fitted as a back up to the heating appliance. In the event of a boiler failure, you can switch on the immersion heater via the spur switch / timer that is usually located within the same airing cupboard space. Please remember to switch back off once the heating appliance is operational again.
12. You could have a frozen condense pipe. In periods of long, cold weather, the section of the condensate pipe which runs from the boiler to the drain can freeze. 

Troubleshooting Videos

Please find some troubleshooting and instructional videos that tenants might like to try at home, should they find themselves without heating or hot water (without having to schedule an engineer visit) .

Frozen pipes

You can try unfreezing the boiler condensate pipe yourself by holding a hot water bottle or heat wrap around the pipe, you may need to do this several times.

When you think the pipe may be unfrozen, try switching on the boiler again. You may need to reset the boiler to do this. If the boiler fires it up, it’s fixed. If not, you could try to unfreeze the pipes again.

If none of the above works

If you are not able to resolve the problem with the help of the above advice please report a repair to us. 

Reports of loss of heating are usually attended to within 24 hours.

If you report the problem after 7pm the report can not be dealt with until the next day, unless you are a vulnerable tenant (for example the elderly or those with young babies) where we will do our best to arrange a visit as soon as is possible.