Householders aren’t checking engineer credentials
Almost half of Brits (42%) would not ask a heating engineer to show their Gas Safe ID card before letting them work on a gas appliance, a new survey by Worcester, Bosch Group has found.
The study, carried out ahead of Gas Safety Week 2016, found that more than one in three people didn’t know that they should check an engineer’s credentials before letting them start work in their property.
Respondents said that some of the reasons why they don’t check were that the engineer had been recommended by a friend (19%); they were too embarrassed to ask (12%), or they simply felt the engineer looked genuine (11%).
Even those who said that they would ask for the ID card said that there were occasions when they would be inclined to let their guard down. Over one-quarter of people were less likely to check that an engineer was registered if they had been recommended by a friend; their heating had broken down in winter (15%), or if they had struggled to find a heating engineer in the first place (12%).
Martyn Bridges, director of Marketing and Technical Support at Worcester, says: “There is clearly a worrying indifference among homeowners when it comes to verifying the credentials of anyone who comes to work on their gas appliances.
“Initiatives such as Gas Safety Week are an important tool in educating homeowners and protecting the exemplary safety record of heating engineers in this country.”
However, what is just as concerning is that 1 in 10 of the people questioned said they had never had their boiler serviced. And 46% admitted to having skipped booking in an annual boiler service, raising further questions over the current policy of optional boiler servicing.
Martyn adds: “Alongside sound advice such as only using a Gas Safe registered engineer to fit, fix and service your appliances, we would like to see an increased focus on encouraging homeowners to have their gas appliances serviced every year. Nearly 80% of those we asked thought annual servicing should be made a legal requirement.”
