Web Blog of Greg Mathews

Unwanted Expense before christmas

I am not happy today, I am sat here in about 4 layers of clothes as I have had to turn the gas off.

Why?

Well yesterday our oven decided to pack up on us. It has been given us the odd warning I must admit.

I took the measurements of the housing, the width and height and measured the depth from front of oven to wall. We then procedeed to the local electrical store to get a replacement. We told the assistant our predicament and that we wanted to take one away and she told us which where in stock.

We chose one, she charged my debit card and then phone the store room to bring it through to be told the only one they had was damaged. She then offered me a smaller, cheaper oven with the remainder refunded. I said if I had wanted the smaller cheaper one then I would have chosen that in the first place so she offered to refund the payment to my card.

I was not happy with that, I told her that if they gave me a full refund it had to be cash as although they take they manage to debit my bank account instantly, when a refund is applied it takes 3 or 4 business days to be refunded to my account and therefor refunding my card was NOT an option. Ah guess what she said we can’t refund in cash.

A manager was then called over, I told him that, as they have sold me a ‘damaged’ item they are bound by law to offer me a replacement of equal or higher value. Unfortunately I knew they did not have any available to take away (have dozens on show but about 4 in stock). I was getting so annoyed that Tracey took the kids to wait in the car:) The Manager went away and came back offering me the one on display with a discount which will be refunded to my card. I told him that he ‘has me by the balls’,  A full refund means I can’t go elsewhere to get one until the refund hits my account and unless I go for the cheaper smaller oven I have no choice so I took it.

We get home, I remove the old oven (which is electric) and smelt gas. It turns out that the gas feed to our Gas hob has a connection that is a bit loose. I did tighten it up but I was not happy so felt I had to turn the gas off. Legally here in the UK you have to have a registered gas engineer out to do any gas work, even minor.

OK so gas is now turned off, we needed to put the new oven in position at least so it’s out of the way, Fits in snuggly except for the fact it is deeper than our old oven, and even though the depth to the wall is enough space, the Gas pipe to the hob is away from the wall slightly so stopping the new oven going all the way into the housing unit.

I spoke to a gas fitter, who I only know in passing, this morning, unsuprisingly he is ‘rushed off his feet’ today but has someone else in the area this afternoon and will see if he can fit us in. I do hope so as a lot in the building trade finish for Christmas today and trying to get someone else before Christmas out is going to be near impossible and/or cost a bloody fortune.

When I do get the fitter out, I hope he can move the gas pipe without having to rip out the kitchen units, if not then I need to decide whether to go ahead with that or get an electric hob, which then needs wiring by a qualified electrician legally adding more expense which we could do without this time of year.

Oh the fun of Christmas, don’t you love it?

Update : I called someone else out as I hadn’t heard anything by lunchtime, fortunately I cought them just as they where about to close, someone was here with half hour, fixed everything including moving the gas feed and the oven fits just nice. It cost £70 but I suppose it could have cost a lot more.

Greg and family happy and warm again.

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