Hi guys, sorry i haven't been around much this week, i've been a very bad blogging neighbour, but i will try and get around everyone's blogs this evening
(This is my new mantra)
What a bloody week!
First, i was awoken by the Bearded Wonder in the early hours on Sunday morning having chest pains and violently shivering, my poor hubby has a heart murmur, so this was doubly worrying, though i distinctly remember saying "what do you expect me to do about it?" thinking he was just cold (i'm not a great thinker when i've just woken up lol) then grumpily told him to go make me a cup of tea to get his circulation going , then i sort of got my act together, 999 was called and i was instructed to give him 4 aspirin and wait for the ambulance to turn up.
They came and checked him over and hooked him up to the heart monitor thingy whilst i rushed about like a headless chicken packing a bag, fully expecting to go to hospital, only to be told he was fine and it was most likely a panic attack due to having mild chest pains all evening (which he conveniently forgot to mention to me)
So they went away and we stumbled our way back to bed and slept in until 11, which brings us nicely to the second "drama"
The boiler had broken.
Now in our neck of the woods when it snows, it really snows.
Not for us the light sprinkling most places seem to blessed with, and of course, being snowy and icy it was REALLY flipping cold! You wouldn't have needed a fridge to keep your milk fresh in this house, just place it next to the closest window.
The emergency engineer was called out and we were informed that it was either a gas valve or the spark generator and he didn't have the parts and would have to come back either Monday or Tuesday, once the part was ordered and delivered (luckily we are with a housing association or it would have cost a fortune!)
So, we accepted this with good grace, we had hot water bottles and blankets ,and we bundled up in our gloves and hats. Monday came and went and in the evening i rang the emergency line only to be told that an appointment wasn't available until THURSDAY!! Well i was livid! The poor girl on the phone got a bit of an earful (i know it wasn't her fault but i was past caring at that point) so she got another bloke to come around with some emergency heating in the form of electric heaters, which eat up the electric like nobody's business (in 3 days it has used up £6!)
We also remembered that we have an electric fire (we don't use it so we often forget we have it) so we had a little extra warmth (what a couple of dimwits we are haha )
And, just to top it off, because of the icy cold temperatures the smoke alarm had decided it had had enough (hadn't we all?) and went off every time the hallway door was left open for a second too long.
Another engineer came today and according to him it only needed re-setting!
5 DAYS with no heating or hot water (i was soooo desperate for a hot bath).
I did get cheered up by this lovely little chap though, who we puppy-sit every now and then for a friend.
He's such a funny little thing, he's at that adolescent stage and is constantly getting up to mischief.
This morning, he had only been in the house 15 minutes when he decided he wanted to see what was on the other side of the TV and knocked the clock off that was sitting on top of it. it's a good job the TV is an old heavy big backed one haha
Maybe if i hide under the table she won't notice i broke the clock
So, i think that's pretty much covered my rant, i shall be popping over and reading everyone's news shortly.
Fat SOS i got the ginger beer plant yesterday,thank you!
I shall be doing a post on that later in the week :)
I think this is the week in January where we all have had enough, know what I mean.
ReplyDeleteoh i know exactly what you mean Marlene! i think i may hibernate until spring lol :) x
DeleteI worked in social housing for 25 years and as I read your report tonight I thought that you should have been offered top up heating straight away so I thought oh good when you said you'd got it (although they were late bringing it out to you) But when you said that the second engineer said the boiler just needed re setting! - that is poor......really poor - just a suggestion but you should really be making a complaint with regard to the way you've been treated - put it in writing - mark it as a stage 1 complaint and send it in - you are due some answers and possibly compensation for being left without central heating because of an engineers failed capabilities - good luck if you do complain xx
ReplyDeletei know, thinking about it now i am annoyed at myself for just taking it and thinking that it was ok for them to take 4 days to fix an emergency. It's just figuring out what to say in my complaint, i am a pretty polite person, and hate being rude to people (Though i do if it gets the job done quicker) would you have any advice on how to word it?
Delete(and to top it off it was my time of the month so already i wasn't in the best of moods lol)
Thank you :) xx
Hi sorry I'm on catch up - head up your letter as stage 1 complaint, bullet point what happened on what day/time and if you have the names of the engineers who attended even better, advise them that your partner suffers with a heart condition and suffering the cold with only minimal heat can only make his condition worse and labour the points that you were not offered top up heating immediately and that the engineer who finally fixed it advised you that it didn't need a new part but just resetting - advise them that you are a good tenant and do not feel that you have received good customer service......really just stick to the facts and give the investigating officer enough info - address it to the Complaints Manager - if they come back and say the way you were treated was acceptable, write back saying that you want to escalate your complaint to a stage 2 complaint and that you want a higher graded officer to investigate it, always reminding them that you can always take your complaint to the Housing Ombudsman - hope this helps - I've paid compensation out to customers for lesser complaints than this, so you go for it - good luck xxx
DeleteI remember our ginger beer plant, it lived in the pantry so that it did not grow too fast. There was more than one case of exploding bottle, so make sure that you keep a close eye on them.
ReplyDeletei'm thinking it may be easier to do them in plastic bottles , i hate loud noises lol :) xx
DeleteYou poor thing! It sounds as though you have had a terrible time, actually, scrap that, no sounds like, you have had a terrible time. So sorry!!! I do hope that the bearded wonder will be OK and not have any more problems, I am sure that you did right though by getting him checked out and looked at. Hope that things get better from now on!!! xx
ReplyDeleteI hope so too, these things come in three's though, so with any luck that will be all for a good while haha :)
DeleteThe Bearded Wonder is fine and i am making him a Dr's appointment next week for an all round MOT so keep everything crossed :) xx
we had EXACTLY this experience last year, except we needed a new boiler and had to foot the bill. spending a week without a boiler in January was like moving to the Antarctic! hope everything settles down soon and you can get back to relative normality, glad the Ginger beer plant turned up, All the best
ReplyDeleteFast-SoS
Ugh, it's horrible isn't it? It's a good job we had plenty of blankets and just enough money on the electric meter or we would have been well and truly snookered haha
DeleteWe are slowly getting back to normality, it's horrible when things like this happen, everything seems to slow down and you don't know where to put yourself or what to do lol x
You poor thing, things can only get better xx
ReplyDeletei hope so, though we have a week of destruction coming up soon as we are getting half the walls ripped out downstairs to put in a damp proof course, so hopefully the house will stop falling to bits haha :_) xxx
DeleteYou've definitely had your share of drama. On the plus side, having a lovely doggy come to stay is something nice, even though he causes dramas of his own.
ReplyDeleteYes, with any luck that will be it for a good long time haha
DeleteHallam is such a lovely puppy, if rather like a bull in a china shop, he also took it upon himself to go on a little wander by squeezing through a gap in the fence and poor hubby had to go chasing after him in his slippers as i was dealing with the engineer haha xx
That sounds like very poor service, that first chap clearly didn't know what he was talking about! I agree about complaining, I know they can't work miracles but four days is along time without heating in the winter. I would write it down and leave it for 24 hours or longer and then re-read it, I find it is much easier to spot my mistakes. If you are complaining I find the best way to approach it is to imagine if you were reading the letter yourself, how would it make you feel about the person who had written it? You don't want to annoy the person you are sending it to!
ReplyDeleteThat's a very good idea :) i do understand that it will take time to fix things, but what irritated me is that the girl on the phone said the engineer won't call until he gets the part, whereas we get stuck in limbo waiting for him to ring thinking it would be Monday, i would have felt much better about it if he just gave us a quick ring to tell us it wouldn't be until Thursday,rather than promising he would call then not doing so, if that makes sense? haha
DeleteI'm taking your advice on board and am going to sit and think about what i'd like to say :) xx
Let's hope this week is an improvement then! Sounds awful - hope you are warm by now.
ReplyDeleteit has been so far :) i'm keeping myself calm by doodling haha :D xx
DeleteBlimey what a week, glad your husband was ok panic attacks are horrible in themselves. Sorry to hear about the bolier but glad you now have hot water and heat again. Heres hoping this week is a better one for you, dee x
ReplyDeleteThank you Delia :) he's feeling much better now, thank goodness
DeleteI've had a bath almost every single day since it came back on haha
This week should be much better, my desk is full of doodles (keeps me calm) and we get paid this week, yay :D xx