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Saturday, November 15, 2014

This is not a rant. Honest!

Just one of those things to upset the peace


This is a story about a commercial transaction that went totally wrong. Some of the actors were reasonable and others completely useless.

Our old kitchen water heater had served us for ten years and had to be changed. Along came the technicion with a new one and installed it and it worked. While doing this he discovered a leak in the butano line that had been a danger to us for a number of years. Every time we lit the stove with the window closed we ran the risk of blowing ourselves up.

The machine seemed to work well for a week, although there was a new machine smell, or so we thought.  Exactly one week after it had been installed, while I was using the hot water in the bath, the water suddenly ran cold, so I turned off the tap, and finished my bath with cold water. When I left the bath I went into the kitchen and found it full of black smoke. The heater had simply caught fire.

First thing we did was to call the installing technician, who practically had a heart attack. He called the manufacturer in Barcelona who promptly called the Valencia office, and they promised to call us. Monday passed, no call. Tuesday we called everybody we spoke with the day before. But the man from Barcelona was annoyed that Valencia had not yet called us to find out what day would be best for us. Eh? Yesterday, of course! After a couple more calls Valencia said they could "fit" us in on Thursday.

Why didn't the manufacturer show more concern that their machine had caught fire in a customer's house? Probably because it happens often? I don't know.

Thursday: The man in Valencia was knocking on our door first thing in the morning. He came in, took one look at the situation and swore. After doing some checking he asked whether we were using Natural gas. No, seƱor, we use butano. Me cargo en la leche! The technician had installed a machine that was calibrated for natural gas with butano gas. He had taken the machine from a box that read butano. Apparently it was no wonder the damn thing burnt out in a week.

Then the man looked at my receipt and said , but this was installed on the 11th of March. (11/03/2014). I said, no, it was installed last week, the 3rd of November. We argued, I lost. He said the machine was outside its warranty and there was nothing he could do for us, and left. A totally useless turd of a man.

We went back to the installer and politely told him what was the problem and firmly requested that the matter was put right that very day. And it was! He even changed the date to the new day, 11/13/2014. Oh well!

The thing that worries me is that when it comes to the use of gas there have been so many cases of houses having been blown up, and some people have even been killed or seriously injured.

Perhaps I worry too much. Then again, maybe not!

Copyright (c) 2014  Eugene Carmichael