Gas Servicing and Checks

• Annual Gas Servicing
• What do I do if I have no gas?
• How do I check a card operated gas meter?
• Central Heating Checks
• Power Cuts
• Carbon Monoxide Detectors
• Gas Programmers

For information about what to do if you smell gas in your home, visit or Major Fault Guidance page.

For more detailed information about repairs, please see the Tenants' Repair Handbook.

Annual Gas Servicing

All our gas appliances are on an annual servicing programme. When you receive a gas servicing letter please call us to make an appointment.

As a landlord we have a legal requirement to carry out an annual service of all our appliances.

If after various attempts to gain access to your property access is denied, we will take legal action to obtain access to carry out the service and recharge the cost of this action to you.

What do I do if I have no gas?

• Check that your main gas tap has not been turned off.
• If your gas meter becomes faulty you need to contact your gas supplier.

How do I check a card operated gas meter?

You need to carry out the following checks:

1. Is there money on the gas card?
2. Check the screen on the meter. Are the words ON or OFF displayed? If OFF turn off your appliances then reinsert the card.
3. Press the red button.
4. The screen will show to repress and HOLD the red button.

• The meter will bleep and make a whirring noise that will go off when charged to ON.
• If CALL HELP appears on the screen contact the telephone number on your gas card.

Central Heating Checks

My boiler isn't working and I have no heat.

• Check the timer programmer display. Your timer programmer is usually in the airing cupboard or near the boiler.
• Check the electric isolation switch is switched on. The isolation switch is usually in the airing cupboard or near the boiler. See if the electric isolation switch is OFF. If it is, switch it on.

The electric isolation switch is on.

• Turn the programmer switch to continuous.
• Ensure that the room thermostat is turned to maximum to check the heating operation.
• Wait for approximately 30 minutes, if you still have no heat call us to arrange an appointment for a gas engineer.

Power cuts

Why isn't my gas central heating working?

• In a power cut the gas central heating system will not work. This is because the system, even though it is operated by gas, still needs electrical power to run it. (Gas fires and gas cooker hot plates will not usually be affected by a power cut).
• When electrical power has been reinstated, your gas central heating system should return to work as normal.

The power cut is over I have waited 30 minutes and I still have no heat.

• Check the heating programmer is set correctly.
• If it is and you still have no heat call us. If you are calling outside normal working hours please wait to be put through to the duty callout officer.

Since the power cut my heating hasn't been working properly.

• Check the heating programmer is set correctly. If you still have a problem please call us within working hours to arrange a gas engineer to come out to reset it.

Carbon Monoxide (CO) Detectors

Oxford City Homes fits carbon monoxide detectors to properties where open flue appliances exist.

What are open flue appliances?

• Radiant type gas fires, back boilers or appliances using a flue pipe through the roof (instead of a chimney) and require ventilation.

Why is my detector making a noise?

• If your detector starts to bleep continuously turn off the appliance and call us.
• Occasionally a single bleep will repeat itself every few minutes (like a smoke detector) this usually means battery failure of the unit.
• Call us to arrange a replacement.

Oxford City Homes carries out an annual gas service of our appliances to keep our systems in good working order and safe. CO detectors do not replace the need for an annual gas services, so when you receive your next service letter please ring and make an appointment.

Gas Programmers

We are committed to achieving 100% gas servicing of our appliances. To help us achieve this we are beginning to install gas programmers that will alert tenants that a service is due thirty days prior to the service date.

If the boiler service is missed or ignored, this gas programmer will activate an audible alarm and instigate a safe but uncomfortable level of heating/hot water by cycling the system on and off. 

This will continue until the system has been serviced and the programmer reset by one of our gas servicing engineers.

Related Documents

• Gas Leaflet part 1 (286 kB PDF)
• Gas Leaflet part 2 (138 kB PDF)

Useful Telephone Numbers

Gas servicing repair and installation for private residents and businesses

If you are a private resident, business or organisation and would like more information about our commercial gas services please visit our Oxford Direct Services website.

Page last reviewed 1 March 2012