Smith & Byford Reviews 673

They installed my boiler dangerously, with the flue pushing against a wooden part of the structure of my flat and with the boiler not even straight on the wall. Unbelievably, they sent a surveyor who asked whether it was a ‘big issue’ for me. It is downright dangerous - and the worst thing is I have no choice what cowboys are sent as a social housing tenant. Social housing shouldn’t mean s*** and dangerous housing.

I had to give this company one star because I had no choice, but in my view, they deserve no stars.For about 10 and a half months my boiler works perfectly okay. I have heating and hot water when I need it. Then I get the dreaded letter and email to say my gas safety check is due. I don’t know what they do when the do eventually come out. I don’t know if it’s deliberate so they can keep coming out or the engineers they send out don’t know what there doibg. But 99% of the time after they have left my boiler goes wrong. Then we have to go through the long process of getting someone out. When they come out lo and behold it needs a part they don’t carry on the van. Then it’s a long process to get them out again. This time was the same so my partner had to take a day off without pay as he had no more leave left. They came out and fitted the part. Couple of days later it went wrong. Had to have an emergency engineer out that night who said the part was not fitted right and there was something els wrong with it. Engineer should have noticed the other fault when he came out the first time. Partner had another day with out pay and they came back and supposedly rectified it. Friday night it’s gone wrong again. No hot water unless we rebooting it and have it in constant which cost more. I’m disabled and can’t stand in the shower so need a bath. There supposed to be coming out today. Let’s see what happens. I wish my housing association would get in a new company but there probably cheep. If you don’t have to deal with this company avoid at all cost

Absolutely shocking company. I would rather not deal with them but due to the council I have to! The customer service agents on the phone seem very stressed out and tired. It's also a waste of time speaking with them as you get all different information each time you call. Based on the reviews how is this company still trading!!!!!

So as a tenant with my landlord every year there is a gas safety check which has to be done legally I had one booked in today this morning 6/5/25 8-1 slot, but every single year smith and byfords engineer fail to attend after I've booked a date and time slot with them for this because they attend the neighbours address across the road (block of flats) and this happens everytime I have re- booked after the first engineer has done this also it takes several attempts for an engineer to actually come out to the correct address (it's literally directly across from the wrong address over the road so easy to find especially as they have the whole address!). So who knows why they keep doing this as its completely different addresses and postcodes only the door number is the same which means each time waiting in for nothing! 4-6 attemots is made usually.So it happened this morning again ,I called them up explained and yep the enigeer had gone over the road but even the lady I spoke to was confused as to why as agreed address and postcode are completely different. She apologised as I explained it happens every year and takes several attempts though no fault of my own to get done. She told me she'd get the case re-opened to re-book I'd assume and call me back after lunch time, Ive had no phone call so I called back only for someone to hang up the phone when I said hello again assume as it was 4:45pm and the phone line closes at 5pm I had been waiting to get though to speak to someone for some time also! Absolutely ridiculous! So wish me luck hopefully the check will eventually get done sometime this month !

The man turned up checked all the important things that he had to check and all over with in about 15 mins the man had been to.my property before so that is better than he knows where he has to check .

Very tiered with this company must change immediately. I have issue job with my boiler small cap missing they left me with no hot water or heating for more they mount there excuse is 2 man job and they have no one valbal today i received call from s&b saying one engineer called sick so till next week maybe someone will come ihave 3 kids 2 under 5 we are suffering from this situation . You are not Professional at all you should get - 5 star

Shocking been with gas for a month

DO NOT USE... rude cocky workman, especially the call handlers.Poor work service, I'd be surprised if they are fully qualified

Disgusting customer service. All day and more without hot water and heating. Have a vulnerable child in the house and the rude out of hours person is as useless as a chocolate teapot. No idea what she's doing, what the company she works for does, absolute waste of space. Part needed but no one knows how long this part will be, bank holiday weekend pending, it's school holidays and I'm left with no water, no heating, no answers, no timescale and vulnerable children. Disgusting

Absolutely excellent company. They are efficient and proficient. Cannot fault them. Michelle Munns who has assisted with all correspondence has been completely professional and outstanding. She is a credit to the company as is Dave Nightingale.

I am Disabled and have had no Heating or Hot Water for 10 DAYS.

Very incompetent. Staff like to patch things over instead of putting new parts in. They fob you off from speaking to the manager and will make you go days without gas and hot water if you have a fault.

I am a Southwark council tenant and for the past 5 years I have had problems with my boiler, it vibrates and makes a go’s awful noise that’s loud and terrifying for me and my emotional support dog, who is now emotionally unstable because of the noise from the boiler. In the past 6 days I’ve had 4 engineers come out to fix it and they haven’t done it?! I have been videoing the issue and I have just spoken with a young lady who listened to me but still referred me back to the local authorities to raise another job? On Tuesday a young man came to my house with a new gas valve and he informed me that the other part that’s needed he didn’t have with him. I have had 2 more engineers out and it’s obvious that they are not reading the previous report that the engineer has written, because if they had they would have come out with the part that’s needed. I have nowhere else to go, but to my council and raise another repair?! I am however making this a stage 1 complaint and I will be escalating this to the next stage. But I will be contacting my local ombudsman this morning by phone to make them aware of this matter. I already have a claim against my local council and I will be calling my legal team to see if they can add this to my claim? Because it’s gone on for far too long as I am disabled and have had carbon monoxide leaks and had my heating system shut down during winter months and was given electrical fan heaters that are a £1 a minute to run!! I am unemployed because of my disability and have had expensive bills because of this situation. Well today I am fighting back, I have had enough of this issue and I am going to take it to the highest possible solution.

Thank you Aaron was an absolute star efficient and pleasant when he came today to fix my boiler I am very grateful for the prompt action and the kindness and respect from the office staff

I am a Wandsworth Council tenant. A couple of weeks ago,just in time for a spell of relatively colder weather, my radiators in the bedroom and lounge stopped heating up. Smith & Byford sent out their guy who arrived on time, very nice polite guy, made his assessment and booked a return visit for 2 guys to come out 4 days later. 4 days later (Today) the 2 man team arrived . Very polite and nice guys. Did the necessary work and had my radiators working and the covers back on in excellent time - no faffing about- great communication of what was wrong and what they were doing. A credit to their company
Thankfully I have only needed assistance with central heating problems three times in 3 years but on all occasions the Smith & Byford service was excellent 100%

An hour after this post went live, they have onve again requested information, I guess it looks good for them somehow.

Wrote a complaint to them on the 23rd of November and they still haven't got back to me. Now my boiler is leaking again, no doubt they will come and temporarily fix it after leaving us without hot water and heating for weeks. And I still won't have a response to my complaint.

They asked me for information when I wrote my initial review and then claimed they had the wrong email after emailing me and then continued to ignore my complaint. No wonder my housing provider use them, they're as rubbish as each other.

Live in Waverley and we are horrified by the lack of service and failure to fit parts ordered.

Causing stress and increased and unnecessary costs to our council. This needs to stop and the council needs to take this company to task

So after being promised that an engineer would be sent during a call at around 6 a further call some three hours later found that no one was going to turn up as the job had been allocated for tomorrow.

At around 22:00 I called again as it sounded like a motorbike in the house to be told and engineer would call.

Surprise surprise no call.

Update 25/03/2025 The lies continue promised to arrive today to complete the job. Problems sourcing the part and they had a crash.

I am a Woking Borough council tenant and theys cowboys they don't know what they're talking about especially Phil they need to be sacked from Woking Borough contract asap the previous contractors thames way were a lot better and do the job once and fix the problem. Smth & Byford they like to milk the system ie come back and fixt a 20 minute job to earn more money from Council contracts Phil the operative is the worst he gos out side and make phone calls wen he meant to be working fixing the problem rather than being on the phone and just look on how many bad reviews they've got that just shows you how bad they are 24 pages of bad reviews 1.4 star that just sums it up I have made a complaint to Woking Borough Council lets hop woking will sack them and find a replacement company

Smith & Byford have failed to fix a serious issue affecting multiple residents in my block in Peckham. I reported the issue on January 3rd when my heating and hot water started failing. I was provided with portable heaters but given no solution for the water. At least four other households are also affected.

I have been proactively chasing them, making countless calls to push for updates—yet the pattern remains the same:

-The engineers come, say they need to order parts.
-It takes weeks for parts to arrive, and in the meantime, I hear nothing unless I chase the office.
-Even when the parts finally arrive, I have to chase again to get them to come back and do the work.
-When the engineers return, whatever they do doesn’t fix the problem—so they order more parts, and the cycle repeats.

The office also tells you that engineers are coming and that you must be at the property, but no one shows up. So be prepared to waste your annual leave for absolutely no reason.

The engineers Dennis and Tom genuinely seem to want to help, but the company’s operations and lack of follow-through are completely failing people.

Smith and Byford is an absolute disaster of a company. They showed up unannounced at my door, claiming I had booked a boiler service when I had done no such thing. After calling them for clarification, I discovered that Southwark Council had provided them with my personal details without my consent, and now I am apparently stuck on some mysterious service list that I never agreed to.

Not only is this a serious data protection issue, but Smith and Byford also admitted they have no way to remove me from their list. So now, I am expected to endure annual harassment from their engineers knocking on my door for a service I do not want or need. When I asked for a resolution, they palmed me off to Southwark Council, who—shockingly—never answered the phone after 20+ minutes of waiting.

This company is utterly unprofessional, incompetent, and borderline unethical. They are complicit in violating customer privacy and refuse to take responsibility for their actions. If you value your time, privacy, and sanity, stay far away from Smith and Byford.

DO NOT TRUST THIS COMPANY. If I could give them zero stars, I would.

Addendum: To the Smith & Byford complaints department person who called me:

Your engineer left a card with no date, time, or engineer details on it—just a vague instruction:

“Please contact our team on 0808 168 7381 to arrange a new appointment.”

More concerning is the insidious threat printed on the card:

“Please remember that your Gas Safety Check and Service is a legal requirement and you must allow access to your home for this inspection to take place.”

This is misleading and unacceptable. We own our home—we are under no legal obligation to let Smith & Byford into our property, yet you are attempting to intimidate homeowners into compliance.

Before making baseless claims that a "fake engineer" visited my home, perhaps review your own records. Your denial doesn’t hold up when the "impersonator" conveniently left behind an official Smith & Byford card with your actual contact number on it.

This is either gross incompetence or deliberate deception—neither of which inspires confidence in a company handling critical gas infrastructure.