A FAMILY have been told their heating will be fixed before Christmas after the Oxford Mail contacted their housing association landlord.

Rebecca Speke said her heating system broke last month, leaving her family without water and her three-bedroom home in Jerome Way, Shipton-on-Cherwell, near Kidlington, frozen.

On December 1, she said the housing association Sanctuary delivered two heaters to the home she shares with partner Aaron Clicker, 34, and her sons Callum Pitts, 20, and Jake Speke, 14.

Two days later she said she was told engineers could not visit her for another seven days and a engineer visited her on December 10 to obtain a quote.

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But the retail assistant said she was told engineers would not repair the heating system until January 16.

When we contacted Sanctuary Housing they apologised and said it would be fixed but did not say when.

However, a spokesman later said it would be done on Tuesday.

Miss Speke added: “It took days to get somebody out to look at repairs. If it had been done before, I would not have had to wait so long. It just took too long.”

Miss Speke said she has been having to fork out an extra £40 a month just to run the two, 2,000 kilowatt heaters.

She usually pays £30 a week for her electric bill, which includes hot water and heating, but now pays £70 just for heating costs. And with the extra costs, she has had to cut back this Christmas, buying a chicken instead of a turkey.

She added: “We scrape by, we have got to. It is upsetting.”

Miss Speke said she was “devastated” because the ordeal left her unable to care for mother Margaret Merchant, 65, after she spent four days in hospital following a hip operation, Maintenance operations director Paul Finch said: “We are sorry for the length of time it has taken to fix the problem.

“We tried to repair the boiler but when this proved unsuccessful we ordered a brand new air source heat pump.

“Unfortunately, this is not something you can buy off the shelf but we are delighted we have managed to locate one and will be installing it at Miss Speke’s home on Tuesday, in time for Christmas.

“In the meantime, we have provided temporary heaters and would encourage the family to apply for compensation to cover the cost of them.”

Miss Speke said that, despite the good news, she had not heard from Sanctuary.

She added: “It’s brilliant, absolutely brilliant. It means my mum can come to me for Christmas.

“I have not heard from them but I have not had a signal at work. I’m definitely glad I got in touch with the Oxford Mail.”

 

 

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