Glow Worm Boiler PCB (Printed Circuit Board) Failure

[Guest]

My wife noticed an electrical burning smell yesterday, which was strongest in the kitchen. As we have had a fire at home before, we were very keen to trace this in order to prevent another one.

We managed to identify the smell as coming from the boiler, a relatively new Glow Worm model.

Upon opening the front cover, I noticed that the front edge of the PCB was badly charred and melted and one of the neon indicator lights had failed and the bulb was blackened and burnt.

I asked my wife to turn the boiler on and saw a small flickering flame and smoke rising from the board. Not what you would expect to see on the electronic control board of a gas appliance!

We turned off the heating and hot water and spent a cold evening in the house and I intended to contact Glow Worm this morning in order to solve this issue.

Upon discovering that their telephone lines for Customer Care, Technical Help and After Sales were all engaged, I resorted to calling their Spares line - reasoning that, in keeping with most companies these days, they only want to sell, not listen to problems because what they have already sold is not working.

Finally, I managed to speak with an engineer, who confirmed to me that the PCB's fitted inside their boilers should not fail and should "last forever."

I then sent this message via their website.

My (model boiler) has failed, due to a manufacturing fault.

I have discovered that this is a common failure and that this part (part no: XXXXXX) has been revised now four times.

I eventually managed to speak with a member of your technical department this morning who informed me that the board should not burn and fail in the manner that mine has and should last, in his words ''forever.'' This is also my contention and given that the rest of my central heating system is in perfect working order and that this failure is clearly due to a manufacturing fault or poor design, I would like to suggest that you contact me in order to replace this board without delay.

Should I be forced to purchase one and have it installed then I will be looking to you to reimburse me for any expense incurred.

I have contacted Consumer Direct, who have passed this on to Trading Standards on my behalf as they consider this matter to be a serious safety issue.

I have photographs of the burnt board, still in situ and will be happy to provide these to you.

Finally, I would like to point out that providing a list of telephone numbers that are either permanently engaged or that simply do not get answered does not constitute “Customer Care” and my experience today has fallen far short of the lofty promises made in the “Our Mission” section of your website. Furthermore, I find it most ironic that the opening line of your “Service & Technical” page begins “You’re in safe hands with Glow-worm” – just how safe is a gas appliance when the PCB controlling it bursts into flames?

I look forward to your prompt response.

[Guest]

Re: Glow Worm Boiler PCB (Printed Circuit Board) Failure

I received the following in reply.

Dear Cetelco

Thank you for your recent enquiry.

Firstly may I offer my sincere apologies for the problems you have experienced with your Glow Worm appliance.

I note from our records that we have never attended your property to assess the appliance and are unaware of when the boiler was installed or it’s service history. It is therefore extremely difficult for me to offer an explanation for the failure of this component.

All Glow Worm appliances are supplied with an initial twelve month warranty from the date of installation to protect our customers against manufacturing defects. Thanks to stringent quality control, failure within this period is rare. However, if any component were affected by a manufacture or design defect, I would certainly expect it to fail within this period.

In order for us to investigate this matter further I feel that it would be beneficial to deploy a specialist Glow Worm engineer to your property. As the appliance is now outside of the warranty period, any visits would be made on an initially chargeable basis although if this problem was found to be related to a manufacture or design defect, charges will be reimbursed as necessary. To arrange this visit, please contact our Service Centre on 01773 828100. Alternatively, I can arrange for one of our operatives to contact you directly if this would be more suitable.

I trust that the above is of some assistance to you.


Yours sincerely

[Guest]

Re: Glow Worm Boiler PCB (Printed Circuit Board) Failure

As you can imagine, I was less than pleased and following is my response.

Dear Glow Worm

Thank you for your prompt response. However, I regret to inform you that it is entirely unsatisfactory.

I have attached here an image of the PCB which, upon further investigation it seems is prone to failure. Indeed, one source of information states “All Glow worm (model) boilers have faulty PCB's.” It should be obvious to anyone that this failure is down to substandard manufacturing or poor design or both and is very probably the reason that this PCB is now it its fourth version. A cursory search of Google reveals a plethora of information regarding this PCB and its inadequacy and high failure rate. Therefore, I would take issue with your assertion that your quality control is stringent and the fact that the PCB has not failed during the warranty period is simply lucky.

We are all entitled to our own opinions, but we are not entitled to our own facts and your company’s refusal to acknowledge the failure in quality and design of this PCB does not negate the fact that it is clearly flawed – why else would you keep changing it?

I am going to need to order a replacement part and in order for it to arrive tomorrow, I need to place the order today, before 1500. As I am going to be attending a meeting shortly, I need to act quickly and therefore, unless I should receive a satisfactory response from you very swiftly, I will be ordering this part and I will then be passing that cost and any associated costs on to your company.

Should you refuse to pay for the part I am forced to order then I will issue a claim against your company in the County Court and my claim at that time will include court costs.

That this extremely dangerous situation was spotted on a Sunday afternoon when we were in and could smell the burning is exceedingly fortunate and I dread to think of the consequence should this have happened at almost any other time, for example, during the night.

If anyone from your company needs to contact me, then they may dial xxxxx xxxxxx

Finally, I would like to suggest that you try contacting your Service Centre on 01773 828100, but only if you enjoy listening to the engaged tone.

[Guest]

Re: Glow Worm Boiler PCB (Printed Circuit Board) Failure

Their reply to me is below.

Dear Cetelco

Following discussion with our technical department regarding the issues you have raised I advise that the component we encountered a small number of problems with have not been used since 2002/2003. Therefore, the appliance you have installed at your property should not be affected by this unless the boiler you have installed at your property spent a long time at the merchants before purchase.

If this were the case I advise that our technical department have confirmed that this component would fail almost immediately following installation and would certainly not have functioned satisfactorily for this length of time.

Please be advised that it is perfectly normal for various upgrades and modifications to take place during the lifespan of a product and this should not be taken to indicate the presence of a serious inherent fault.

As I have asked previously, if you can forward this component to me I will be more than happy to have this tested and respond to you further following this.

I trust that this information is of some assistance to you.


Yours sincerely

[Guest]

Re: Glow Worm Boiler PCB (Printed Circuit Board) Failure

This is my proposed reply, not yet sent.

Dear Glow Worm

Thank you for replying to my email. However, again your reply is disappointing and it appears to me that you are intent on wasting my time. For example, kindly show me where you have “asked previously” that I forward this component to you for testing? Rather than this, you have in fact suggested that I pay for an engineers visit, provided that I can actually get through and speak to anyone in order to book it. Furthermore, it is of no comfort to me that you claim you have experienced “a small number of problems” when the product I purchased is one of that “small number.”

Notwithstanding what your technical department may confirm, I can assure that up until yesterday, the boiler did function satisfactorily – right up until the point at which the flames began to melt the board, the result of which you can see, which leads me to wonder what it is that you would like to test, given that it does not work and given the extent of the damage, never will again. In addition I must point out that I do not care for your assertion that my boiler “should not be affected” when it quite clearly is and your insinuation at your paragraph two is nothing short of shameful and you should note that your position does not absolve you of any common obligation toward courtesy and good manners.

I will give you one final opportunity to rectify this situation and unless I receive a satisfactory response before noon tomorrow I will not be corresponding with you again and any further communication with your company will be with your legal department.

Accordingly, kindly furnish me with an address for service. While you are writing to me with your registered address I would also like to know what you did about the components that did “fail almost immediately” for example, was there a recall and if so, how was this communicated to consumers?

In closing I would like to add that I am frankly astonished at your attitude given the consequences of what might have happened, had this dangerous fault not been spotted when it was. Rather than deal with the issue that your products are clearly substandard and sending me a replacement (three times upgraded) PCB, you would rather argue with me about your right to upgrade and modify – please be advised that I was not born yesterday. I share this house with my wife, who suffers from chronic arthritis and two young children and we are now subject to freezing temperatures and no central heating and all you appear to want to do is highlight to me your technical department’s demonstrable incompetence and advise me of your company’s right to upgrade and modify apparently perfectly serviceable components.

If you are in any doubt as to what to do with this message then I suggest that you consult your corporate counsel.

[thephoenix]

Re: Glow Worm Boiler PCB (Printed Circuit Board) Failure

I had a stint in Technical Support (although not at glow worm) and I can honestly say that ALL technical support managers have access to service stock that they will send out FOC (free of charge). Only to those in the know and are willing to argue the original fault with them. I was always sending stuff out FOC.
Didn't matter what is was.

Does the PCB have a dated stamped on it?????????
Would be interesting if the date does not match the date period they mention.

[Guest]

Re: Glow Worm Boiler PCB (Printed Circuit Board) Failure

The board is still in the boiler, it will be changed when the new one arrives.

I have done some research on this and Google is littered with pages regarding the failures of this PCB - apparently this one is known to fail and, as I quoted above, one site stated that all such PCB's fail and this would tend to be supported by the reply I received, where they admit they had a problem.

They have until noon tomorrow to do something positive or I will buy a replacement myself and they will get a bill, along with court costs if they fail to pay it.

[Guest]

Re: Glow Worm Boiler PCB (Printed Circuit Board) Failure

Just and update on this. They gave up – wimps.

I bought a new board on 17 December - but since they are sending me one too, I will return the other one, or maybe keep it as a spare.

Due to their lack of knowledge of the Sale of Goods Act I was able to achieve my objective, a new and free of charge PCB for this boiler. It is a generally accepted principle that the seller of the item is responsible under the Act and had Glow Worm and in particular this woman been better informed, I may have come unstuck as I could have actually lost my Sale of Goods Act rights as I chose to pursue the matter under the manufacturer's warranty.

Incidentally, my boiler was installed in November 2002, but if you don’t ask…

Dear Cetelco

Thank you for your response.

As the problem with this component was resolved by 2003 at the latest, any boilers installed from 2003 onwards will not be affected by this.

At the time we experienced this problem, the majority of failures occurred immediately following installation, therefore the customers who were affected by this were contacting us before their guarantee was registered. As we are not aware of the properties our boilers are installed into until this guarantee is registered, this problem would have been assessed and rectified by our engineers before this documentation was received by ourselves.

As your appliance was installed after 2003 your appliance would not have been sent out from us with the original type PCB installed. Therefore, the only way your appliance would be affected is if this appliance was stored at a plumbers merchants since 2002. As our appliances are supplied with an 18 month warranty from the date of manufacture or a twelve month warranty from the date of installation (whichever is shorter) your appliance would then have been outside of the warranty period by the time it was installed at your property.

As a gesture of goodwill on this occasion I have asked our spares department to send out a replacement PCB to your property. However, please be advised that this component will not be supported by the manufacturers warranty unless it is fitted by a Group Service engineer. Should you wish to arrange for one of our specialist engineers to fit this component, please call our service centre on 01773 828100.

I trust that the above both clarifies matters and meets with your approval.


Yours sincerely