Emergency Boiler Repair London

Boiler stopped working? Do these checks first

A lot of night-time breakdowns are not part failures at all. Work through these in order before you book anyone, because each takes a minute and none needs tools or the casing off.

• Pressure gauge: on a sealed system it should read roughly 1 to 1.5 bar when cold. Many boilers lock out once it falls to around 0.5 bar or lower. Top up with the filling loop and watch whether it drops again.
• Power: check the fused spur next to the boiler is on and the display is lit. If the display is blank, check the consumer unit for a tripped circuit.
• Gas: if the hob or another gas appliance works, the supply is fine. On a prepayment meter, check there is credit.
• Controls: make sure the programmer is on and the room thermostat is set above the room temperature.
• Condensate pipe: in freezing weather, the plastic pipe running outside can freeze and stop a condensing boiler. Pour warm, not boiling, water along it and then reset.
• Reset: press reset once and wait. If the boiler locks out again, stop there. Repeated resets hide the real fault.

If you smell gas, open doors and windows, then turn off the gas at the meter if you can safely reach it. Do not touch electrical switches or use a naked flame. Get out and call the National Gas Emergency Service on 0800 111 999. If you suspect carbon monoxide, get outside, call the same number and seek medical advice.

Is a broken boiler an emergency?

We treat it as one when there is no heating in cold weather and someone at home is elderly, very young, pregnant or unwell, when water is leaking from the boiler, when the pressure keeps dropping, or when the boiler is making loud bangs or smells of burning. In those last two cases, switch it off at the fused spur and leave it off. No hot water on its own is usually a same-day job rather than a middle-of-the-night one, but that is your call to make, not ours.

If you rent, your landlord is responsible for keeping the heating and hot water in repair under section 11 of the Landlord and Tenant Act 1985. Tell them in writing straight away. Our guide on how long a landlord has to fix a boiler explains what is reasonable.

What the engineer does when they arrive

We read the fault code or lockout history, confirm gas pressure at the appliance, and check the flue and condensate route before opening the casing. From there the usual suspects are the ignition electrode, the fan, the gas valve, the diverter valve on a combi, the pump and the printed circuit board. Each has a test, so we replace the part that failed rather than guessing.

Common parts for the main makes are usually stocked by London heating merchants, so many repairs can be finished the same day. When a part has to be ordered, we make the boiler safe, and where possible leave you with hot water or heating running on whatever still works. Gas work is carried out by Gas Safe registered engineers. Each make fails in its own familiar ways, which our Worcester Bosch, Vaillant, Baxi, Ideal and Glow-worm repair pages walk through.

If you want to rule out the simple causes first, the boiler not working checklist goes into more detail, and the boiler fault codes section explains what each display code means by make.

What does emergency boiler repair cost?

The £60 call-out covers getting an engineer to you at any hour. The repair price is agreed with you on site before any work starts, so you can say no before a part goes in. Published UK cost guides put typical market prices, parts and labour together, at roughly £250 to £500 for a diverter valve, £200 to £350 for a fan and £350 to £700 for a printed circuit board. Those are market figures for comparison, not our price list.

Our breakdown of emergency boiler repair costs covers the rest, and our page on emergency plumber costs sets out how we charge.