Which? scores on most reliable boiler

[vulcancontinental]

Also worth pointing out that worcester, vaillant and viessmann are toward the top end of price point where as vokera, potterton and baxi are towards the bottom end.
If some one has paid good money for a good installation as opposed to being on a tight budget and going for the cheapest install, they may well encounter less aggro with there system.

OK, so the more you pay for an installation the better the installation is likely to be?

Can 't deny the likyhood is higher. That plus a personal recommendation will improve the odds. A bit of common sense on the part of the buyer helps.

 

[gas112]

i would say the majority of those in the trade would say worcester do not warrant being in the top of any survey regards quality and reliability then again we only work on them so what should we know.


Johnd on the other hand is a mod who trawls the CC for info .

A guy who said he employed a quality installer to fit his own boiler but had to come on here and ask for them how to get his old boiler of the wall YOU REALLY COULDNT MAKE IT UP

 

[vulcancontinental]

Ah! Rather devalues the public forum then.

 

[JohnD]

removed due to stalkers

 

[gas112]

What your installer was RUBBISH for not knowing how to take a basic boiler off the wall , totally agree .
And no way i would have trusted him to carry on with install if he couldnt even do the basics

 

[D_Hailsham]

When I did a Statistics course, many years ago, we were told that a sample had to be over 1000 for the results to have any reliability.

Do you mean that unless Dan has visited over a thousand customers, and they responded to a standard set of questions, his opinion is worthless?

That's a different type of problem. If Dan has only 200 customers and everyone replies to the survey, then you are not sampling.

But if there are 20 million boilers you need a sample size of at least 1000 to have 95% confidence that the results are within 3% of the true result. You also have to ensure that the number of each brand is proportionate, i.e. if WB account for 10% of the 20 million boiler, then 10% of the sample need to be WB. To be even more accurate you need to consider model and even age to ensure a representative sample.

Adding up the responses, I see that over four thousand boiler-owners responded to "Which". If you know of a broader survey by an organisation with no axe to grind, I'd be interested to see it.

It's a large sample but there is no way of knowing if it's representative of the total boiler population.

The only meaningful information comes from looking at the results from the total sample, i.e x% of those asked were satisfied with their boiler. To rank the boilers according to the individual results is meaningless.

 

[Agile]

Also people don't realise how worthless Which reviews are due to the methodology.

What are the flaws in the methodology?

Which ask their OWN members about their experiences with boilers.

Which members can afford to subscribe to their magazine because they want to buy the best products.

Which members are all social class A/B and can afford to use the best installer and the best boiler. They have them serviced every year because upmarket people do that!

Worcester and Vaillant advertise their boilers using luxury homes and ladies thus promoting the idea that their boilers are those up market people are buying.

To get a fair market sample you would need to contact a 1000 sample across the whole UK and social groups. Only then would the budget boilers be properly represented. There would be problems even doing that unless you knocked on 1000 doors!

I repair boilers and most I visit are the lesser brands. This is mostly because they break down more often but this is usually as a result of poor installation and no maintenence rather than a failure of the boiler part. Many use the same parts anyway.

 

[Dan Robinson]

Therefore Mr D, the which magazine survey is meaningless.

 

[essexmick]

Therefore Mr D, the which magazine survey is meaningless.

What would be useful is a random survey of heating engineers.

 

[JohnD]

removed due to stalkers

 

[Dan Robinson]

Heating engineers are very tribal.

73% of Europe use Android, yet nearly 100% of Vaillant installers use Crapple. Hence no Android app for their products.

Same goes with personal choice in boiler.

There is, albeit a minority of professionals on here that still think wooshitter Botch still make the best .

As VC inferred above, they're boilers are very popular oop North whereas down here there is a tendency towards the "sponsor the weather" brands.

Collectively I call them "iSheep"

 

[essexmick]

It's an interesting POV.

The average householder can ask half a dozen randoms in the pub or on the net, or somebody aiming to sell him a boiler, or can read a survey of four thousand boiler owners.

Perhaps they are all "meaningless" and he may as well stick a pin in the yellow pages.

The same goes for a householder who wants to buy a car, or a washing machine, or a tin of durable paint for his front door.

Are there people who actually believe that consumer tests and surveys don't help?

Maybe they don't tell you the best, but they do help weed out the worst.

 

[Dan Robinson]

There's a big difference between testing a product and asking a consumer their opinion of a product.


When was the last Which laboratory test-to-destruction of a boiler?

 

[JohnD]

removed due to stalkers

 

[jellycat]

Also people don't realise how worthless Which reviews are due to the methodology.

What are the flaws in the methodology?

Which ask their OWN members about their experiences with boilers.

Which members can afford to subscribe to their magazine because they want to buy the best products.

Which members are all social class A/B and can afford to use the best installer and the best boiler. They have them serviced every year because upmarket people do that!

Worcester and Vaillant advertise their boilers using luxury homes and ladies thus promoting the idea that their boilers are those up market people are buying.

To get a fair market sample you would need to contact a 1000 sample across the whole UK and social groups. Only then would the budget boilers be properly represented. There would be problems even doing that unless you knocked on 1000 doors!

I repair boilers and most I visit are the lesser brands. This is mostly because they break down more often but this is usually as a result of poor installation and no maintenence rather than a failure of the boiler part. Many use the same parts anyway.

That's useful info - so a good installation and yearly service can make all the difference regardless of brand?