Bank Holidays - when fuses blow and boilers stop working

There can be no other purpose for the Bank Holiday except to provide a time for essential domestic appliances to stop working.

Your central heating boiler will never pack up at 7am on a Tuesday, in good time to call for a repair by lunchtime and only suffer a morning off work in the process.

No - fuses blow, boilers stop, computers crash, leaks spring anytime after 5pm on the Friday night of a long weekend - usually at the first possible moment. Anything that requires a monster call out charge will happen and will need essential parts from those industrial estates which remain firmly shut for the next three or four days.

So has happened to our boiler at Avalon, Brighton. A house full of bank holiday guests, weather on the turn, and no hot water or heating (hopefully heating is not a problem). From a man on the phone for whom a call out charge of £100.80 applied (what's the 80p for?) it's the thermo-coupler meaning my pilot light won't stay on. 'And you won't get one of them until the shops open again on Tuesday...'

British Gas kindly serviced this boiler last Wednesday. It has worked fine up to then for nearly five years.

My advice if you own a spares shop for boilers or electrical circuits etc. is open on Public and Bank Holidays and close all the rest of the time. You can charge whatever you like to cover your new life of leisure. Be prepared to work hard on the few days you open though because sod's law swings busily into action.

And if you own a guest house make sure you only on Bank Holidays for people who enjoy cold showers.

Brian Snow
Avalon Guest Accommodation.
Boiling a kettle to shave, 8.37pm, 24 May 2008.