Plumbers are mean

Unfortunately my hopes for a trouble free September are not going so well.

We spent most of Sunday relaying the floor in my kitchen following the recent leaking to the neighbour downstairs. That night I discovered we had no hot water as the boiler pressure had dropped to zero.

We topped it back up but by next morning it again was at zero. I then refilled it but by the middle of the morning and phone call home confirmed my worst fears. The pressure was again at zero and we still had a leak.

I quickly ran home, only to discover on arrival that I had left my keys behind and I had to phone Ann to drive across the city and let me in. To make matters more difficult the neighbour downstairs has gone on away for three weeks and not left an emergency contact so I have no idea if it really is flooding, just a strong hunch but I can;t take the risk.

In 20 minutes I have undone the 5 hours of work relaying the tiles and floorboards and I have discovered that there is water under the floor. I phone the insurances home emergency number and they send out a plumber who finally arrives late, grumpy, rude and unhelpful. He tells me that until I've lifted ll the floor and identified exactly where the leak is he can't help and he leaves.

I then have to rip up loads more floor boards and finally identify where the leak is coming from. The insurance company contact the rude plumber who finally calls at 10 to say that he is too tired and is going to his bed. "But its still leaking" I tell him. He tells me how to shut off that part of the system, which I do, but it is still leaking. I phone back the insurance who send out another company who arrives at 1am only to advise he doesn't have the correct equipment to carry out the job and will have to come back. He also advises that the leak in the pipe is not causing my pressure to drop and that there must be another problem???? Arrrrgh

This morning after no sign of the plumber I chase up the depot, who advise that they are still trying to agree the costs with the insurance company. I chase up the insurance company who advise that they are happy to pay the price. I phone up the plumber who then admit they don't have any engineers available to do the repair today anyway. I currently await further news from the insurance company about what is going to happen next.