I moved into my house about 18 months ago, has a Baxi Duotec 28 combi.

Was spring/summer and doing a bit of work on the place so didn’t really use it much.

Had the old energy bills through, jeeee they were using some gas! They had no programmer for it, had a minor hiccup so got it repaired and a thermostat/programmer fitted.

ffwd to November, breaks down again, ignition problems, fitter says the pump is full of muck & bits. Cleans it out, recommends a full system flush at £400. All the radiators bar one are the “new style” of radiator, with one older single panel by the front door.

Drained the system myself, looked pretty clean and put sentinel cleaner in, ran that for a couple of months over winter no issues, drained it and refilled with inhibitor.

ffwd to a month ago before I went on holiday, same problem, ignition, just an adjustment to something needed no parts. Same error happens last week, I restarted it and it worked OK, rang up repair people, oh it’s an old boiler we recommend flushing the system as it’s full of “rubbish” or replacing it.

Thinking hold on, replacing the boiler won’t fix the problem if it’s rubbish in the system (sealed system that’s been drained twice and looked clean so I don’t see where it could come from). If it’s not stuff in the system then you’re inept and can’t find or fix the fault with it in the first place (some kind of inline filter would work wonders surely!?), a boiler seems a pretty simple appliance to me and 5-6 years old it shouldn’t be good for the bin. The previous two places I rented had one minor issue in 5 years and no problems with the first place! My feeling is that the repair co are trying it on and I should get a second opinion, this time I was heading towards the you didn’t fix it properly a month ago route….

The wife got in touch with Baxi who seemed to think there was an update to it and they were going to call me but haven’t done yet.

Looking at the history it’s had a new PCB and a new valve part done in 2014, then had a minor part last year when I had the bloke out.

What would STW do!

I now resent boilers and needing to have one.

Overpriced, over complicated and unreliable IME.

The day I can build /renovate my own super insulated building with minimal heat need so no boiler, the better.

Ignition problems aren’t normally caused by a dirty pump…..

Weismann here getting on for 10 years now and never missed a beat

BAXI bloke came out today & was very good seemingly.

Diagnosed a few things, said would be some parts involved & have to order etc, no hassle. Left his direct number & recommended the 12 month plan at £27 a month as best way to go, would be a couple of hundred straight off the bat for a one off repair, or a year for £300 with warranty etc and other call outs if needed.

That is through Brokenboiler.com whose website gives the impression that they are the main business for this kind of thing. Pretty much everything covered apart from sludge or scaling, since the system has been drained & looks clean & all but one radiator are new style and no problems with cold spots I think I’ll be pretty Ok there.

Any horror stories or reasons not to go for this option?