Colchester family unhappy with Eastlight Homes over no heating

 Jacek Puchrowicz’s gas boiler broke down, leaving the couple and his elderly mother-in-law without heating or hot water for four days as cold weather hit.

Jacek, 56, who works at a recycling centre, has lived in Hakewill Way in an Eastlight Community Homes property with his family for more than eight years.

Jacek claims that this boiler has been faulty for quite some time before it stopped working and believes issues he brought to the housing association have been ignored.

Experience - Jacek says the experience left him and his family distressed (Image: Jacek Puchrowicz)

Area - Hakewill Way in Colchester (Image: Google Maps)

Upon contacting Eastlight, an engineer was sent out but was not able to fix the issue as the boiler had a broken panel.

They were reportedly told they would have to wait several days before it could be replaced.

He said: “This past week we haven’t had heating. I called Eastlight and told them my mother-in-law has been distressed and has been living in the house without heating.

“They said we will send an engineer and they did.

“But they couldn’t fix it because a panel was broken, so we were told we had to wait until November 2.

“They did deliver an electric heater for us to use but it costs a lot of money.

“We have felt frustrated with this experience, it has been so cold in the house.”

Although the boiler was repaired at the end of last week, the family say they still don't have hot water pressure upstairs.

Unhappy - Jacek states he would often wake-up shivering during the four day period and he believes there are many issues that still need to be addressed as there is still no hot water upstairs (Image: Jacek Puchrowicz)

 Jacek said: “It’s not humane to leave people in the cold weather for that long.

"I would wake up in bed and be physically shaking from the cold, I wouldn’t leave animals like that.

“I’m unhappy with them, it stressed my mother-in-law and affected her mental health."

Charlotte Todd, property services director at Eastlight Community Homes, said: "The Eastlight team has been in regular contact with our customer about his boiler, which we can confirm was replaced last week.

"We offered to supply electric heaters to use to keep his home warm until the new boiler was fitted; and now it has been installed, we of course need to address any ongoing problems with the hot water supply.

"Eastlight is a resident-led organisation, and we continually develop our services to ensure they meet our customers’ needs.

"In this case, our customer feels we haven’t met his requirements, or those of his wife and mother-in-law, and we hope to speak to him about this in a lot more detail."