I’ve got a 7 year old Ariston E-Combi 24 FF which has not been working very efficiently recently

A local gas engineer inspected it and came back with the following quote:

REPLACE AAV
REPLACE PRV
REPLACE DIVERTER CARTRIDGE
REPLACE DIVERTER MOTOR
RECHARGE EXPANSION VESSEL
BOILER SERVICE

With a quote of £460 +VAT (£550ish?), saying it’s probably not worth fixing as it’s a relatively cheap boiler

Bear in mind I know nothing about boilers, I’ve tracked down (what I believe are) the correct parts and they come to

AAV £23
PRV £31
DIVERTER CARTRIDGE £18
DIVERTER MOTOR £13

Boiler service was originally going to be £75

So that makes £160 plus the RECHARGE EXPANSION VESSEL and any labour to fit the parts

So does £300ish+VAT in labour sound fair, or is that steep? Or are my prices way out for the parts?

Thanks in advance for any advice

What are the faults on the boiler?

It loses pressure increasingly frequently, and apparently the reason why it hasn’t been heating water effectively recently is as something is broken, and so every time it goes to heat the water, it’s also trying to heat the radiators at the same time.  I then got the above sent through as faults with the boiler – it may well be that all of this needs doing (I wouldn’t have a clue), I just wondered if this was an excessive quote for this work?

There is normally a big price difference on parts when buying online and when buying from merchants/suppliers, I always give my customers the option to buy cheaper online but won’t take responsibility if parts are faulty or copies. And they can also take a few days for delivery when ordering online so not always an option.

So yep the quote depends on how much he has priced the parts at.

I can give you a ball park figure of what I charge, I’m not VAT registered btw

The job indicates two faults

Job 1) Pressure loss, AAV, PRV and EV recharge, I would charge between 90-120 labour depending on a few factors I.e ease of access, corrosion, location etc

Job 2) Rads heating up when taps used, Diverter valve faulty, again between 90-120 labour (as above)

We charge between £50 for a basic service and £90 for a full thorough service

We also normally lower the labour cost when a few jobs are done together for example the job above, the boiler would’ve been drained down for the first job so we wouldn’t need to for the second job.

Thanks so much for this Amaan, I appreciate the detailed response.. I’ll have a think before getting back to them, maybe getting another quote might be a good idea.. Thanks again, I appreciate it 🙂

The expansion vessel may well be shot, so charging it will not help. The hot water problem does sound like the diverter valve. They are a doddle to change. If the expansion vessel is punctured, the easy way to fix it is to fit and external exansion vessel, around £35 for parts, 1 hour labour, and possibly, a bottle of inhibitor, depending how much has to be drained. £300 labour is taking the p. It’s 2 hours work to do that and the divertor.