Albion Towers in Pendleton, home of Salford City Mayor, Paul Dennett, is in the final throes of a £3.9million facelift which, according to contractors, Casey, is now "a symbol of the future of social housing"...
As part of the refurbishment, a company called Ground Heat developed what it calls a 'bespoke inverter driven ground source heat pump' which replaced gas heaters in the apartments. It was supposed to be 'innovative' and 'extraordinary'...except that one tenant says he's been without heating for two months.
"They drilled into the ground's core and said it was a 'state of the art system'" he explains "Well I've got another word for it, it's state of the...it starts with an 'A' and ends with an 'E'...
"They said everything would be controlled from a central point and that you won't have to touch your heating or water system; it will all be done from this central point and be self regulating" he adds "But I've had no heating in my flat for over two months. Luckily the weather hasn't been that bad but the forecasts for the next few months is that the cold will be kicking in, and that's when you want your heating."
The tenant complained to Ground Heat and the response from Salix Homes was to send him a Winter Warm Pack, consisting of a hat, a blanket and a hot water bottle.
"I don't know whether this will stop me getting my £200 winter heating allowance at Christmas" he jokes but the situation isn't funny either for himself or for other elderly residents in the same position...
"One chap said he stood in the kitchen for three hours with the cooker on, he was that cold, while Salix have handed others warm air heaters, which are expensive to run" he adds "Salix won't say much, they just send an engineer round who strips the system puts it back together again and then it goes back to how it was. They've been twice."
Meanwhile, the hot water system in the flat also crashes..."It can be corrected via the 'clear error' screen but ten hours later you've got to go back and do it again" he says "You've got to continually clear the error but it's not supposed to do this, it's supposed to sort itself out.
"Salix said that this a guinea pig block and this hasn't been done anywhere else in Salford, so I suppose all the teething problems are on this block" he adds "In the meantime I'll just keep my jacket and pullover on which I've suddenly started wearing indoors, and wrap the blanket around me while I'm watching tv..."
The Salford Star did contact Salix Homes for a comment but the company hasn't responded.
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