Our Worcester Bosch boiler is now out of warranty at 7 years old. To date have paid £70 a year for an annual service. Can’t decide whether to take out some cover including an annual service or to self insure by putting some money aside. British Gas is £180 a year including a service.

Depends how much a gas boiler is I guess. £180 inc. sounds reasonable, if a boiler is 2K then 20 years of premiums effectively … suspect there will be small print about age of boiler though, so you may just be deferring a cost.
If there was such a package for my 20 odd year old oil boiler I’d take it

British Gas is £180 a year including a service.

We used to use them. We started getting an intermittent hot water problem, so called them out. They turned this intermittent minor problem into no hot water, no heating, and a gas leak. It was the middle of winter and we had a new baby. Never, ever again…

Never, ever again…

As a counter, I use them for a rental property.  Tenants had a problem with loss of hot water and BG pretty much swapped every part of the boiler that’s still available to get it in tip-top shape again.

No problems with British Gas here. This year our boiler had a leaky combustion chamber which toasted some of the inernals. All replaced in an hour or so and no further issues

Tenants had a problem with loss of hot water and BG pretty much swapped every part of the boiler that’s still available to get it in tip-top shape again.

That’s because they have no problem solving skills 😉

I have the cheapest BG boiler cover with an excess, used it recently when a valve switch failed. Overall I would have probably saved money by not having cover, but having to ring around plumbers to get an an demand fix for this would have been a nightmare with no heating in winter..

We don’t insure ours, although its so old, I doubt we could. Just seems like an unnecessary expense. Having said that, I can fix most things myself, so any outage will be minimal.

I’ve asked a couple of installers/plumbers about this specifically and as to whether or not they should be serviced regularly.

Both said it’s not worth either servicing or insuring. Better to put aside the money you would spend for repairs if necessary.

We we’re in a flat for 12 years and spent £300 on repairs in that time for the already old when we moved in Worchester boiler. The boiler was never serviced.

We’re now in our house 2 years with a newish (think around 4/5 years old) potterton boiler. Have spent nothing on this yet.

Both plumbers we’re friends of friends who install/service boilers.

Take from this what you like, I plan to continue spending nothing on our boiler until it breaks down, but then I’m not a great believer in insurance in general.

Take from this what you like, I plan to continue spending nothing on our boiler until it breaks down, but then I’m not a great believer in insurance in general.

Do you have a carbon monoxide alarm?

Do you have a carbon monoxide alarm?

Yes

I self insure most things. If they didn’t make money on cover plans they wouldn’t offer them, and not being in a plan means you can shop around. Only pay for cover if you don’t have funds to pay when required, if you think you’re at high risk of claiming or if it would be impossible to find a plumber otherwise.

…if it would be impossible to find a plumber otherwise

IME this is the greatest benefit to boiler cover if you don’t have a gas fitter that you can call on over Christmas/New Year. Otherwise I’m firmly annual service and save

Don’t start me on BG. Had a Homeplan and our boiler which was 2 years old started dropping pressure. They told me it was undersized which was interesting as they had quoted to replace it at the time with the same boiler. Anyhoo, they dicked around with it and declared it fine. It wasn’t. We were away for a couple of days and my local plumber dropped by to replace some taps and TRvs and smelt gas. Shut it all off and started to investigate. Main gas line in was perforated somewhere under floor space between meter and boiler and had been for some time. Cue floors up and holes cut everywhere. Eventually replaced whole pipe to boiler and lo and behold it started to work fine and has done ver since. Am still in legal discussions with Bg about it ….

Check out your home insurance. Ours is about £25 extra a year for home emergency cover (which also includes other things like making the house secure after break in etc). The only criteria is you have to service it every year.

Last year they paid about £500 replacing various parts when it broke down.

The cover has a much lower limit than the BG etc covers but assuming it’s repairable provides enough cover.

As above emergency cover on your house insurance will get get you a call out a Christmas if you need one. My boiler failed in Xmas Eve

Worcester have a fixed price repair deal which I have used a couple of times. I’d rather do that than insure. The beauty of it is is that you get someone who knows the boilers and has all the spares to hand – and they will fix it if at all possible. Its a gamble because if its a £10 fix you have paid a lot for it – but I did have a complete rebuild of a boiler under it – all replaceable parts replaced

I have BG cover for a rental property, its about £8.50 a month for cover and service. That keeps the guarantee side happy and any callout issues. As for my house my 8 year old bosch has never been touched although about to fit a magnetic filter soon.