Plumber has caused leaks throughout the house

[Reading1986]

Hello

I thought I'd post a post.

I am currently under going a full re dec of the whole house, new flooring, skirting, architrave window boards and nice new rads.

Plumber came to fit the new rads, drained down the system. To begin the work the next day.

I had a call from the kitchen floor tilers to say there was a leak coming into the lounge ceiling / window reveal. Ruined the reveal. Needs plastering or maybe replacing

I called the plumber and he came back round to check straight away. I wasn't in at time and made my way back home straight away. Water had come in from the above bedrooms and into the lounge reveal. I got home and checked the living room out. And around the whole house. Checked everywhere. Plumber had left by the time I got there.

The next day the kitchen tilers rang again to say there is water coming coming through the kitchen ceiling ( alot of it) all over the kitchen floor. Wrecked the new kitchen plinths. Potentially the kitchen floor grout. All the other rooms have had ply laid down ready for amitco flooring. The ply had had a fair amount of water over it. Ensuite flooded. Landing carpet completely soaked around the rad area. So I've had to open an insurance claim.

The plumber is saying that both valves. The heating filling loop were letting water by. So even thou he had drained the system it was letting water by and filling the system up.

Question should he have discovered that the "valves" for the heating filling loop were at "fault" when draining the system. Or is this completely avoidable.

Now left with a huge amount of unnecessary damage. Plumber is demanding a days wage when was only there from 9 to 2pm. He's replaced the 2 valves on the filling loop as he said they were at fault. Also bearing in mind I had a rad capped off month before and some work a month before that. So the system has been drained down twice fully successfully without any issues.....oh this was done by a different plumber. Who I would normally use. But was unfortunately to busy with his schedule to fit me on for this rad work.

So has the plumber been incompetent and not checking the system correctly and making sure it's draining down correctly, also should he have had detected these issues when draining down the system, therefore avoiding all of these issues I now have / or should he have detected the issues on his second visit when I called to say i had a leak in the lounge from the rad pipes above.


Should I pay or not.....would really like some advice. Never had this much damage done or any after a trades man has been in.

 

[bear]

I came upon this once on a new build flat. The plumber was at fault (not me btw!!). 3 flats and this was the top one. He fitted the boiler etc, pressurised the central heating, shut it off then went home. The next day he would pipe the blow off (combi boiler). Unfortunately he NEVER shut off the filling loop properly so the heating pressurised and kept going until 3 bar, at that point the blow off opened and trickled water ALL night in that flat. Soaked the floor of that flat, the ceiling and floor of the flat below and the ceiling of the ground floor flat. The bottom flats were getting handed over in 1 weeks time!!! 🤣🤣 He should have disconnected the filling loop (water bylaw) and capped the filling loop and or had the blowoff connected 1st.
The only thing I can’t understand is if the filling loop Valve was passing, why didn't the excess water go out the blow off? Unless it’s a tun dish that couldn’t take it but it should.

 

[Agile]

This has all been very interesting to read all the opinions.

But I did expect a closing posting from Reading1986 saying if and how it has been resolved.

Although I do little work on radiator systems ( specialising in boiler repairs ), I have to say that if I was confident that I had fully drained the system and it needed further work the next day then it would be possible that I would not waste time capping off rad valves etc. or closing bleed screws on rads which were to be removed the next day.

But the ESSENTIAL work that any competent person would always do is to remove the filling loop and cap off the inlet valve. That would ensure that the system could never be pressurised without the use of tools.

As for testing systems, on a house where I was fitting a new boiler I needed to remove about 8 m of 15mm copper gas pipe. On this length there were TWO fluxed but UNSOLDERED joints that had lasted through 15 years of occasional gas leakage tests!
[automerge]1599821107[/automerge]
Reviews on some of the Find a Tradesman sites need to be taken with caution.

A lady I knew had a clutch replaced but they put a rotation locking washer in backwards and within days the car would not start when hot. ( The flywheel just turned on the shaft! )

When I looked at reviews on this "Clutch" place I saw that virtually ALL the good reviews were for very simple jobs like replacing clutch cables.

The test for any trade is if they can do the more difficult jobs as well as easy ones!

 

[Ben-gee]

I would say that it’s more important that they stick to the easy ones if that’s what they can do - nothing wrong with that.
It’s when people are out of their depth that most trouble occurs....

 

[Agile]

I would say that it’s more important that they stick to the easy ones if that’s what they can do - nothing wrong with that.
It’s when people are out of their depth that most trouble occurs..

It seems to be human nature to work up to the next level above what people can do competently!

 

[spanner]

Hello

I thought I'd post a post.

I am currently under going a full re dec of the whole house, new flooring, skirting, architrave window boards and nice new rads.

Plumber came to fit the new rads, drained down the system. To begin the work the next day.

I had a call from the kitchen floor tilers to say there was a leak coming into the lounge ceiling / window reveal. Ruined the reveal. Needs plastering or maybe replacing

I called the plumber and he came back round to check straight away. I wasn't in at time and made my way back home straight away. Water had come in from the above bedrooms and into the lounge reveal. I got home and checked the living room out. And around the whole house. Checked everywhere. Plumber had left by the time I got there.

The next day the kitchen tilers rang again to say there is water coming coming through the kitchen ceiling ( alot of it) all over the kitchen floor. Wrecked the new kitchen plinths. Potentially the kitchen floor grout. All the other rooms have had ply laid down ready for amitco flooring. The ply had had a fair amount of water over it. Ensuite flooded. Landing carpet completely soaked around the rad area. So I've had to open an insurance claim.

The plumber is saying that both valves. The heating filling loop were letting water by. So even thou he had drained the system it was letting water by and filling the system up.

Question should he have discovered that the "valves" for the heating filling loop were at "fault" when draining the system. Or is this completely avoidable.

Now left with a huge amount of unnecessary damage. Plumber is demanding a days wage when was only there from 9 to 2pm. He's replaced the 2 valves on the filling loop as he said they were at fault. Also bearing in mind I had a rad capped off month before and some work a month before that. So the system has been drained down twice fully successfully without any issues...oh this was done by a different plumber. Who I would normally use. But was unfortunately to busy with his schedule to fit me on for this rad work.

So has the plumber been incompetent and not checking the system correctly and making sure it's draining down correctly, also should he have had detected these issues when draining down the system, therefore avoiding all of these issues I now have / or should he have detected the issues on his second visit when I called to say i had a leak in the lounge from the rad pipes above.


Should I pay or not...would really like some advice. Never had this much damage done or any after a trades man has been in.

The fault at the filling loop? If the systems drained the loop should be disconnected. Although its not the point for draining but with system previously up and running should have been completely removed. The filling loop is a temporary measure to assist only when refilling or topping up the primary system.

 

[Gary80gas]

Once you break into a sealed pipe you become responsible for what comes out. Always cap off pipes/valves.