Oh dear.After a great start (polite and efficient start, engineer on time for first appointment) this all went wrong from my point of view.Engineer told me on first visit that my Bosch oven was no longer working because the control unit had blown. He checked there was power coming through and showed me there was so there was clearly something wrong with the oven. He ordered me a new control unit and returned 3 days later to fit it. Cost so far: £78 call out and £102 for the part. Only the oven still didn't work because he now told me that the function selector switch was connected to the central unit and as he'd fitted a new central unit and the oven wasn't working, it must be the function switch. Oh and the bulb had gone inside the oven as well.I then found out the function switch would take 10-14 days to arrive because it had to come from Germany. This was then revised down to 7-10 days and it took 5 working days.My Dad flat sat for me and let in the oven engineer for his third visit. Guess what? He fitted the function switch and the bulb and the oven didn't work. He spent 90 minutes at my flat and called a colleague and then checked the socket (the oven is hard wired in and has an isolator switch). Conclusion was that there was something wrong with the socket as there was only 3 amps of voltage coming through and I needed an electrician. Oh and that will be £78 please for the switch and the bulb.I get a telephone report from my Dad telling me all this and I then called Phil at Domestic Repairs. I tell him his engineer has taken 3 visits before finding what now appears to be the root of the problem and I would have expected him to have done this on the first visit. I am deeply suspicious about the need for any parts at all. Phil says the engineer has been doing the job for 25 years and he will speak to him and call me back.Phil calls me back. The engineer says there has been a power surge and that is what has blown everything in my oven. Phil offers to send out Domestic Repairs electrician free of charge. I tell him that I already have an electrician lined up and I will see what he says and call Phil back. Phil is polite and we have a civilised conversation but I make it clear I am not happy at all and say to Phil more than once that I am sure he can understand why I have a few question marks about what has happened.Next day I am at lunch with two colleagues and have shared my tale of woe. What the three of us know about electronics you could write on the head of a pin but we all think it is nigh on impossible for there to be a power surge that ONLY comes down the wiring to my oven. A power surge would have fritzed everything, surely? By chance, the sparky phones to say he will be a little later than planned arriving at my flat. So while he is on the phone I ask him about the power surge theory. Total fallacy, he says. Power surge would have knocked out everything. Thank you, I say.Electrician arrives at my flat. Dad is flat sitting again. Electrician takes 30 seconds to find the fault: the neutral wire has come adrift. He goes to buy a new socket, doesn't charge for the time he is gone, doesn't charge for the socket and fixes the problem. The oven lights up. I used it tonight. It works. Cost: £96.I phone the electrician to thank him for his promptness and for getting the oven working. He tells me he thinks that the oven repair man has taken one look at the oven, seen that power is coming through and therefore assumed that it must be a parts failure. Even after fitting the first new part, he didn't check the power when the oven still didn't work. He just ordered more parts. Electrician also says it is highly unlikely that three things would go wrong with an oven all at the same time which I think the repair engineer should be aware of as well.I am going to phone Domestic Repairs on Monday morning because I want the money I have been charged for parts refunded to me. I probably don't stand a snowball's chance in Hell but I am not going to allow this astonishingly bad and lazy service to pass without comment.Two things I have learnt from this: get an electrician first and don't pay for the repair if the appliance doesn't work.
Allison Franklin ● 5233d