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Our toilet has been troublesome for some time - flushes, then paper comes sailing back in a sea of brown water, which makes the toilet very hard to clean. After several months of trying to find an available local plumber, I looked online and found "Local Heroes", who said they find plumbers/electricians/gardeners etc. in your locality.
I filled in the drop-down boxes outlining what we needed and they offered me someone to come the next day and the cost would be £94 including VAT. Knowing that plumbers can be expensive, I agreed to this.
Next day a man arrives - it turns out he has driven from a long distance (so not "local" then) and he is from Dynorod. He pokes around and says there is no manhole to this toilet and he will have to create a way in via the cistern (It's just a small plastic bit) - he tells my OH (who has PD) that it will cost £180, and (when I was out of the room) OH agrees to this! He then does his poking around and informs us that the problem does not lie with the drain but with the cistern and we need a plumber, which is what I asked for in the first place! He says he does not know how to do it!
He then informs us that with VAT, the bill will be £216. So, here we are being asked to pay £216 and the problem remains.
I got back to Local Heroes and had a number of phone conversations with them. They maintain that they sent DynoRod because I said the toilet was blocked - in fact I did tick that item in the drop-down box because there was no other relevant option.
I then had a call from DynoRod themselves, who said they would talk to the boss and get back to me, which they have not done. In the meantime I have been inundated by requests for this bill to be paid.
My argument with them is that I cannot be expected to know the cause of the problem (I am neither a plumber nor a drainage engineer) and that LH chose to send a drain person who knows nothing about cisterns and their workings, leaving us in this mess. When I knew that it was Dynorod coming I looked them up online and noted that they call themselves plumbing and drainage experts so I assumed that this would be fine - but when I tackled DynoRod on this they said that the two arms of the business are separate - but how could I have known this?
What to do?
Update: I have been out all day but have come back to an email from Local Heroes to say they are sending a plumber to sort out the problem. I had already managed to stop the flood of repeat bills by contacting British Gas.
What I do not know and what I have asked in my reply to their email is what teh cost of the plumber is. I am awaiting a reply on this.
Thank you all for your support and advice over this. Much appreciated.
When I moved into my house five years ago I took out British Gas Homecare 400 which covers my gas, electricity and water. I am so glad that I did as I have called them out several times with plumbing problems, leaking radiators, faulty electrical sockets and a temperamental boiler! After having a new boiler fitted last year, I now pay less than £30 a month.
My most recent problem was with my toilet which began to gurgle after the flush and the water level in the bowl was very low. After a quick phone call, a Dynarod plumber came round and identified a partially blocked drain which like the OPs toilet problem, needed a different branch of Dynarod to fix. But they came out as an emergency as it is my only toilet and took up manholes etc, flushed through and off he toddled. A couple of days later, the same thing happened again and when I called BG Homecare, I was treated as a priority as it was an ongoing problem and this time the correct action was taken to remove a blockage which was in my waste pipe before the manhole ie my responsibility.
My point is that I did not have to find a plumber and be faced with a extortionate bill, all these call outs were covered by my annual contract. Yes, I know that if I had not needed to call them out, I would still have paid each month but for peace of mine I think it is well worth it. I reckon I am well in credit based on the number of times I have called them! Certainly worth it is you do not have a local plumber, electrician or heating engineer to rely on.
We had something very similar happen to us recently. A man who lives nearby did some work for us but didn't resolve the problem and in fact, after two visits, had made it much worse. We should have refused to pay the £105 he asked for but were reluctant to have bad feeling with someone living nearby. On reflection, we were stupid!
I hope the matter gets sorted out Luckygirl.
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