Smith & Byford Reviews 674

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.

Took a day of work today,waiting in all day, for an engineer, the people in the office were polite but the guy never showed up, same problems last year and year before that. Guy has showed up, thankfully all ok now, at 7.30pm but glad to have sorted.

Worst company ever . I’ve been left with children days to weeks with no repair (no hot water or heating) .

Cowboys.
These clowns are unmanaged with a heavy dose of lethargy. I should have written a review on them 3 years ago but have given them the benefit of doubt but now it’s clear they’re pranksters. Book them in, told them specifically “ do not arrive between 16:45pm and 17:30 pm”. waited in, the whole day (as they don’t give a specific time) for them to arrive at 16:55pm, the only time I’ll be out! This hasn’t happened once or twice, no no, it’s happened 8 times over 3 years! The exact same thing!

I am severely disabled as a full time wheelchair user.
I called up RHP in late February when my heating/ hot water failed at approximately 4pm.
I am unable to keep warm without central heating and was quite frightened.
The female operator was strong on information but non existent on sympathy.
Apparently being seriously disabled means nothing to this company as the earliest appointment was the next day, sometime.
I could have frozen to death and this company would not have given a damn.

Genuinely the most incompetent, unorganised and rude company I’ve had the pleasure of dealing with.

I kind of guessed I was in for a treat with these lot when the customer service automated response opens with “we will not tolerate any abuse” I can kind of see why you need that now.

The customer service team are truly awful and defensive from the get go. No matter how polite and thankful you are! it truly comes across as a very toxic work environment for those guys. It’s clear they’re not looked after or have had any form of training in relation to booking jobs and even pretty bog standard customer relations.

Currently been without heating and hot water for a week, the heating I can live without…. But being without hot water is extremely difficult. The boiler has now been leaking for a week also, have a constant flow of water that needs mopping up.

Was told on the phone the day I logged it that it was classed as an emergency as it’s an uncontainable leak and an engineer would visit that day. “But the engineer won’t call you” why? How hard is it to make a call between jobs?

Engineer came out around 22:30. He could barely string a sentence together, told me he can’t find where the leak is coming from and he will escalate it with his manager. I asked will you be back tomorrow to fix it? “No, your boiler is F@ck@ed and it’s going to take a long time to fix” we’re his words.

I’ve not had a single phone call with any update from smith and byford since I logged it. No update on when it will be fixed. No update on any further visits. Every time I call I get told something different.

1 week on, still no heating or hot water just a very leaky boiler. I would have expected an emergency to have at least been resolved within 48 hours. Not 1 week and still no communication.

There must be some pretty big back handers flying between this company and the executives in charge of the gas tenders as no landlord who truly cared about the well being of their tenants who pay good rent would put Smith & Byford in charge of such a crucial contract.

Smith and byford are very harassing business if they call once they call twice three times in a day continuously leaving messages if you ask them not to call they call back several times and the numbers come up as scam.

Polite and friendly. Lovely and warm again. Thank you.

Once again waiting in all day for the “imaginary” engineer to turn up for the same problem. Apparently claiming someone came to attend the property and took a picture of the front door as evidence. Thank goodness we have ring doorbell.

Shift #2 6-11 or who knows when??!

Smith & Byford's telephone staff are absolutely awful. I feel bad saying this because they probably pay them so badly that they can't get people who are able to think about what they are saying or doing, but it's agony sitting through their scripted, but "i don't give a shit" blurb.
They rarely get anything right and a follow-up call makes me lose the will to live because they have no idea what the previous colleague has done, so you go through their brain-dead rhetoric all over again. Dreadful!
I spoke to one young man who basically said "if you don't take the call-out today you'll just have to wait until another date comes up but I don't know when that will be" I was at work, so couldn't take that day. So I said "well can we book another date while I'm on the phone now?" He replied "no because you don't want this appointment today, you'll just have to wait for another appointment" honestly we went round and round this until I managed to get through to him that maybe, just maybe as he had the calender in front of him, we could book another day. Finally i got another day booked in. But i was on the phone for ages. His attitude towards me was terrible and although it's clear he hates his job, it's not right that this spills out onto the customer.🤯
Answer to S&B reply: I have called two more times since this review and both times I'm told "somebody will get back to you" why cant anyone on the phone deal with the situation and book in an appointment? Why has this dragged on for so many months?

When the engineer eventually turned up, a new part for my boiler was identified. The engineer said it would be in stock and ready for fitting by the following day.

To make sure that this was going ahead, I made contact with Vickey at Smith & Byford who was upset that I was contacting her at the weekend and would only book an engineer on a day when I wasn't able to attend.

I then spoke to James who told me that the job had now increased in complexity and had been moved to 6 March, but I may be able to get a better deal when I spoke to a manager who was due to contact me on Monday.

There was no contact from a manager on Monday.

I called back again and eventually spoke to Amanda, a manager who assured me that she would get back to me later that day with a resolution.

No contact from Amanda either.

19 emails, 7 phone calls and 14 days later, I still have no hot water and idea of when they will attend. Nobody responds to emails, nobody answers the phone in good time and no one returns phone calls when they say they will.

Unhelpful, uninterested and full of excuses are about the kindest things I can say about this company

Twice now, we have booked a boiler repair in advance, only to wait all day with no one turning up. Today our scheduled slot was 12 PM – 5:30 PM, yet despite calling for updates, we received misleading and inconsistent information, such as, “They’re in your area” and “The engineer works until midnight.” (This assumes we have all day and night to just be waiting).

Additionally, when I called on the 12th of Feb at 7:38 PM, I was assured that a note would be made for an engineer to come on the 13th, but no one arrived. We have now been without heating for two weeks, and the lack of communication—no confirmation calls, texts, or emails—has been extremely disappointing.

The call operators have also been dismissive and unhelpful. This level of service is unacceptable, and I expect an immediate resolution. Waiting for a clear update on when this issue will be resolved, along with a reference number for my complaint.

I will be escalating this matter further otherwise.

twice now we have waited for them to come to carry out repairs, all booked weeks in advance to wait in all day for no one to turn up, called at lunch time told its a all day appointment called at 4pm then was told it wasn't a appointment to carry out works but for someone to come and knock the door to make an appointment. 2 wasted days iv had to take off work never again will make appointments with this company

Awful company leaving disabled people to freeze. They lie as standard. Takes on average 20 minutes for them to even pick up the phone . I honestly believe there is something very wrong with this company.

The engineer attended on a Monday and I needed a part to have the boiler fixed. Called them Tuesday to confirm that they were ordering the part. Was told the part was ordered and just waiting on a Contracts Manager to approve my job so it could be booked in, and I would get a response in an hour. I heard nothing so I called back the next day and was told that it had not been approved.

When I questioned how an approval to fix a boiler in the middle of winter had not been completed I was told "the contracts manager approves over 1000 of jobs a day". I thought this was completely disgusting. It seems outrageous that as an organisation you clearly cannot meet the demand of your contracts and the people that lose are those in social housing, who can go where else. I asked when I could expect to have the approval completed and the work started. I was given no real answer, just that the customer agent understood.

I asked where I could complain I was palmed off to elevator music. I am now a mother with a child who has not had heating or hot water for almost a week and has no real idea of when I may have my boiler fixed.

Update: the contract manager finally signed off my job on Thursday. I received a call saying I could be booked in on Monday....... EIGHT DAYS after my boiler broke. I was told there was nothing they could do. However, when I pushed to speak to a manager I was given the following day as a call-out.

Today is the day they are meant to come out. I had not heard anything by 4 pm, so I called to check and the lady said the engineer had "a few more jobs, but should be with by 6 pm". At 5:55pm I received a call to say the engineer's car broke down, and I had to be booked on Monday. I of course pleaded as I am at my wits end. to which the agent just simply said he "cannot physically do anything" and when I asked for a manager he added "the SLA with Lewisham Council says repairs are to be completed within 7 days" so they are legally covered and tbh I read as 'I do not have to do anything to help you". It genuinely feels as though they knew they were not going to be attending today and just strung me along. As if it is not the middle of winter. I feel sick at the lack of care they have displayed.

Every person I have spoken to over the past week has been vile and devoid of any empathy. I cannot believe my council has outsourced such a vital repair service to an organisation which has a rating as low as 1.4. I will be raising this with the council ombudsman and the housing ombudsman.

Vile company. I had no heating since December, had to go and get electric fan heater only heats one room, walking about with our coats hats on indoors , we are old age pensioners. Phoned them and one gas man came out and said I needed a new part, 3 weeks went by and I received a inspection report never had a inspection. Phoned my housing association to make a complaint. They lie saying they called and no one was in. Never answer a phone and don't call back on call back.my housing association got them to come fixed a valve then left. The boiler came on then went off, now the program is dead and no boiler. This appalling company needs looking into

They genuinely do not care about vulnerable people. We been left without heating for a week now. Engineer has come out and parts have been ordered. The only thing left to do is for a manager to approve the job and allocate an engineer to it. I’ve been calling everyday, and not a single thing has been done. It’s shocking how our government can outsource contracts to this type of company. When I questioned them on SLAs, they say they are unable to give a time. How can you not have service level agreements in place for emergencies? It’s just shocking how this company operates, seems like front line staff is taking all the heat whilst managers sit on their hands.

Had boiler issues 3 weeks ago. Rang and given an appointment for over 10 days till the 1st appointment. Arrived, no parts to fix need to order. New appointment 3 weeks after reporting lack of hot water. Sat in all day no one turned up. Engineer lied saying he came no one in. Spoke to manager or apologised etc etc someone coming today.
5/01/25. Got a phone call stating engineer has called in sick cancelled again. 3 days i have taken off work so far for a simple fix.
Manager promised me someone would be coming. Have never experienced a business so poorly managed. Maybe the owner of smith and byford should read these reviews because they all seem very simular. You should be ashamed taking government money and not giving the same service you would to private cumstomers. Remember its that money that is allowing you to draw massive dividends every year.

The worst customer service I’ve ever experienced. The repair company assigned to fix my boiler was not only incompetent but also rude and unprofessional. They delayed the repair for days without explanation and showed no urgency, leaving me without heating or hot water for over a week in winter. When I expressed my frustration, their staff had an awful attitude, dismissing my concerns and even threatening me that I couldn’t take legal action against them. Absolutely unacceptable behavior. If you need reliable boiler repairs, stay far away from this company—they are completely untrustworthy.

Complete waste of space come to do a repair and want do a service check. on the boiler that’s broken I ring them up as I’ve got no heating are no hot water just for them to say you need a new boiler when the part comes to £298 constant liars I’ve been without hot water and heating since Thursday one of your managers were supposed to call me back on Friday morning and no one has even bothered to call