We’ve had a holiday home in France since 2005. In 2006, we had a wood stove installed by a local supplier. He fitted it to an existing chimney. Over the years, we’ve had a lot of building done and we’ve had the chimney swept regularly, a requirement of our house insurer. No one has ever found any issues with the chimney and after sweeping, have provided the necessary certificates.
This year, we mad an appointment with a sweep who failed to turn up yesterday. So we asked another chap who also does plumbing, electrical and general building works. He’d just replaced a mixer tap and fixed a leak in the ancient plumbing. He inspected the chimney and then said he wasn’t able to clean it. He said it was dangerous for a variety of reasons such as the stove being too close to the wall, the flue being too narrow and also too close to the floorboards etc. Now, I don’t enough to gain say him. But what I find incredible to believe is that every previously used professional has failed to find any issues at all with the chimney or the stove. When we remarked that we’d had several different professionals work on the fire and chimney who all certificated the work, he said they must be criminals. I find this very hard to take. Knowing how fastidious the French are to observe ‘les regelements’ why would they risk not only civil proceedings but also criminal convictions for their work?
The last guy said he’d reposition the stove, and do the remedial work to the chimney for €1500 in April. We are going to get other professional opinions about the supposedly necessary work as well as the remedial costs. But it does strike us as somewhat bizarre that, after all the historical works carried out, only now does one tradesman discover faults that he says would have always been apparent to the other professionals.
This year, we mad an appointment with a sweep who failed to turn up yesterday. So we asked another chap who also does plumbing, electrical and general building works. He’d just replaced a mixer tap and fixed a leak in the ancient plumbing. He inspected the chimney and then said he wasn’t able to clean it. He said it was dangerous for a variety of reasons such as the stove being too close to the wall, the flue being too narrow and also too close to the floorboards etc. Now, I don’t enough to gain say him. But what I find incredible to believe is that every previously used professional has failed to find any issues at all with the chimney or the stove. When we remarked that we’d had several different professionals work on the fire and chimney who all certificated the work, he said they must be criminals. I find this very hard to take. Knowing how fastidious the French are to observe ‘les regelements’ why would they risk not only civil proceedings but also criminal convictions for their work?
The last guy said he’d reposition the stove, and do the remedial work to the chimney for €1500 in April. We are going to get other professional opinions about the supposedly necessary work as well as the remedial costs. But it does strike us as somewhat bizarre that, after all the historical works carried out, only now does one tradesman discover faults that he says would have always been apparent to the other professionals.
