Boiler Broken Down in Milton Keynes? What to Do First

The boiler has stopped. No heating, maybe no hot water, and it is always a cold morning when it happens. The good news is that most breakdowns are not dangerous and a fair number are sorted in a few minutes without anyone coming out. Here is what to do, in order.

The first five minutes: safety

Two things come before any diagnosis.

• Can you smell gas? Do not touch light switches or anything electrical. Open the windows, get everyone out, and call the National Gas Emergency Service on 0800 111 999 from outside. It is free and open 24 hours.
• Is the carbon monoxide alarm sounding? Get everyone into fresh air and call 999. If anyone has a headache, feels dizzy or sick, tell the operator it may be carbon monoxide.

No gas smell and no alarm? Then the breakdown is almost certainly an inconvenience rather than a danger. Take a breath and start working through the checks.

The next ten minutes: checks you can safely do

None of these involve gas or the inside of the boiler. Do them in this order.

• Read the display. Most boilers made in the last fifteen years show a fault code when they stop. Write it down exactly, including any letter. Worcester Bosch, Vaillant, Baxi and Ideal all publish their code lists, and the code is the first thing an engineer will ask for.
• Look at the pressure gauge. On a sealed system the needle should sit around 1 to 1.5 bar when the heating is cold. Below 1 bar and the boiler may refuse to fire. You can top it up yourself using the filling loop or filling key, following the manual. If the pressure keeps dropping over the following days there is a leak somewhere and that needs finding, not just topping up.
• Check the thermostat. Is it actually asking for heat? Check the set temperature is above the room temperature, the timer is in an 'on' period, and the batteries are fresh if it is wireless. If you have a Hive or Nest, check the app has not been switched to away or holiday mode. Dead thermostat batteries account for a surprising number of 'breakdowns' every autumn.
• Check the condensate pipe. Every modern boiler has a plastic pipe that drains a small amount of water. If it runs outside and the weather is freezing, it can ice up and the boiler will lock out, often with a code that points to ignition. Pour warm (not boiling) water along the pipe, or hold a hot water bottle against it, then reset. If this happens every winter the pipe needs insulating or rerouting, which is a quick job for us.
• Try one reset. Press and hold the reset button for a few seconds and wait. If the boiler fires and runs normally you may have had a one-off fault. If it locks out again, stop. Repeated resets do not fix anything and can make the eventual repair harder.
• Check the gas supply. If you have a gas hob, does it light? If not, the problem may be your supply rather than the boiler. Check the meter for a message and ask a neighbour if theirs is off too.

If you are still cold at the end of that list, it is time to call someone.

Is this an emergency or can it wait?

Treat it as an emergency if any of these apply:

• Vulnerable people at home. Babies, elderly relatives or anyone with a medical condition should not be left without heat in winter.
• Water coming from the boiler. A drip that is getting worse can damage the boiler electrics and whatever is underneath it. Turn the boiler off at the switch and put a bowl under it.
• No hot water at all and no way to heat any.
• Anything involving a gas smell or CO alarm. Covered above, and always first.

It is urgent but not an emergency if the heating is off but the hot water still works, the boiler runs for a while after a reset before cutting out, or it is mild weather and everyone in the house is healthy. It still needs looking at, but you have a day or two to book a normal visit rather than an out-of-hours one, which is usually cheaper.

What the visit involves

A repair visit starts with diagnosis, not a parts swap. The engineer will read the fault history stored in the boiler, check the gas pressure, the flue, the electrics, the pump, the fan and the sensors, and work out what actually failed and why. A frozen condensate pipe or a stuck pressure switch can be fixed on the spot. A failed fan, pump, diverter valve or circuit board depends on whether the part is on the van or has to be ordered. We carry the common parts for Worcester Bosch, Vaillant, Baxi and Ideal, which covers most of what we see in Milton Keynes, but nobody carries everything.

What you pay for a repair is made up of the diagnosis time, the part itself and the labour to fit and test it. It goes up if the fault turns out to be in the system rather than the boiler, for instance sludge in the radiators that has wrecked the pump, and it goes up out of hours. Ask for the price of the repair to be confirmed before the work starts, once the fault is known. Any decent engineer will do that without being asked.

Here is the honest bit most emergency adverts leave out: if your boiler is fifteen years old and the fault is a heat exchanger or a circuit board, a good engineer will tell you whether that money is better put towards a replacement, even though a repair is the easier sale. We would rather you made that call with the facts than paid us twice.

What to ask before you book anyone

• Are you Gas Safe registered, and what is your number? It is a legal requirement for anyone working on a gas boiler. Check the number on the Gas Safe Register website. Ours is 957816. The engineer's ID card also lists what work they are qualified for.
• Can you actually come today, and roughly when? Plenty of numbers advertise 24-hour cover and then offer you Thursday. A straight answer is a good sign.
• What is the call-out charge and what does it include? You want to know whether diagnosis is included and when you will be told the repair price.
• Do you carry parts for my make of boiler? Tell them the make, model and the fault code. It changes what goes on the van.

Local firms tend to win on this. Someone based in Milton Keynes knows the grid roads, knows that a 1970s house in Netherfield or Fishermead probably has a different setup to a 2015 build in Broughton, and is not dispatching from a regional hub forty miles away. National brands are not bad, they are just further away and you talk to a call centre rather than the person coming out.

Stopping it happening again

Most of the breakdowns we attend in Milton Keynes were building up for months. Kettling noises, pressure that needed topping up every few weeks, radiators cold at the bottom. A yearly boiler service picks these up while they are still cheap. If it is the second or third call-out in a year, ask about boiler cover or an honest conversation about replacement, whichever fits.

Need someone today?

If you have done the checks above and the boiler is still down, our boiler repair service covers Milton Keynes, Newport Pagnell, Bletchley, Wolverton, Stony Stratford and the surrounding towns. Get in touch or call 07805 844 016 with the make, model and fault code and we will tell you straight away when we can be with you.