UK Landlord Forum / Life

May I ask what are my rights against the gas safety certificate issuers?

My management agent had gas safety certificate done on my property that has recently been let to new tenants. The tenants wanted to change from prepay meters to direct debit meters, so yesterday the gas meter was changed. But the meter change engineer had to turned off the gas supply because there was a gas leak!

Today, the agent's contractor went to have a look, and found the boiler valves are leaking gas! Only 11 days ago the gas safety certificate was issued.

I am currently fuming. The gas safety certificate issuer clearly did not do their job and have put my tenants at risk.

What are my rights against the gas safety inspector? For and not spotting a gas leak.

Assuming you can demonstrate, on the balance of probabilities, that the gas leak was present when the certificate was issued, you are entitled to recover any costs you incurred as a result of the leak not being detected at the time. In this case, that would be any additional costs of having to carry out remedial works while the property is tenanted (assuming the tenants have moved in since the gas check was done), and any costs you have incurred as a result of your tenants' being without gas while repairs were arranged. It goes without saying you're also entitled to a refund of the cost of carrying out the check in the first place! You are not entitled to compensation for what might have happened.

If you think the tester was negligent you should also report the matter to Gas Safe.

Thank you for your reply. Unfortunately the problem is not as the same as you have assumed.

Property was empty for just under 1 month, in January.
Over first week or so, I had registered for pre-pay meter and paid about 15 pounds to heat the property while I do work (replace wardrobe, shower head holder, new curtains, etc. small things) The boiler and everything seems to be fine.
I only visited the property briefly during the last 2 weeks of vacancy. I forgot to check on the meters.
When the tenants moved in, I notified utility company and received a £40 bill. I talked to the utility company saying I know my usage had been covered by my top-up, the gas reading is obviously wrong. After some back and forth, utility company agreed it seems wrong for an empty house and agreed to issue a new bill with only the standing charges.
I suspect the gas leak could have started here while property was vacant.

Fast forward to March, gas safety inspection was carried out mid-March. After the tenants have moved in.

It seems I can demonstrate (if I can find the original £40 bill from utility company) that the gas leak was present when certificate was issued.
But I don't satisfy your second assumption on tenant move in time.
Am I still able to recover repair costs of the following:
1.   Gas safety inspection cost
2.   Gas engineer call out to diagnose and isolate the boiler. (£75)
3.   Gas engineer call out to fix the boiler. (£470, still Emailing the agent about this one. This probably should be covered by myself, because I should have paid it anyway, to pass certificate)

I'd say 1) and 2) are perfectly reasonable. Given the sums involved, if you write a firm letter to whoever carried out the original inspection, there's a decent chance they'll just pay it without further argument (albeit probably without admitting liability).

In theory you could also bill them for the gas that escaped up the flue! :-)