Need some advice on this to see if it's as weird/unprofessional as I think.
No hot water last night, boiler well and truly gone, ok not great two DC's under 4. Letting agent has an online reporting tool so nothing to do but log and call in the morning. Which we did.
When we clicked the issue on the digital tool a pop up tells us to continue reporting on there but for this problem to also call the emergency line, I mean in my head it's v urgent but not an emergency as summer. Called twice no answer.
Gets an auto-response from agent saying that this problem (heating and hot water) is classified as urgent and that they will attempt to deal with urgent queries in 3 working days.
We were a little eeekkkk, what does that mean, have someone out or just respond, being Thurs eve we were a little panicky and the thought of it not being dealt with until the start of next wk - we have nowhere to go as the three people we could ask have covid!!! I called the emergency no again and left a vm saying we've just received this email, if someone receives this tonight I'd appreciate a quick call or text just confirming that 3 days won’t be the case and stop me panicking I was nice and jokey about it.
45 min later nothing, and as we have a really good (small city) FB page I thought I would ask on there to set my mind at rest;
"Does anyone rent with xxxx and has had experience of no hot water/heating, and their xxxx online reporting system? We reported the problem via xxx but have received a response back saying this has been categorised as urgent - it then lists all the urgent issues (emergency issues above this are basically major structural problems). And that they will aim to deal with the issue within 3 working days of the issue being reported.
I'm not sure what deal means, but I'm taking from this it could be into next week before its resolved given it's Friday tomorrow😅😱. Surely this can't isn't right, is it? I was thinking there would be some kind of 24hr call out for boiler issues??"
We're all just recovering from covid, DC have conjunctivitis and just wanted some reassurance before I went to bed that I wouldn't be waiting 3 days. I haven't rented since 2007 so have no idea what is to be expected.
Fast forward to this morning they email DH to say someone organised for today, great, they then followed up with call to confirm - I picked up, I was bright and breezy on the phone and like oh thank god, thank you, yes seen email etc. and was about to say we were panicking as your online thing says the above, but, to say the agent was being aggressive was an understatement, I thought DH had maybe complained this morning or there'd been some kind of altercation and he'd not said, so I said sorry is there a problem do you need me to get DH, when they exploded at me, not in volume more tone IYKWIM. How they would have expected me to come directly to them if there was a problem, how disappointed she was in me, at which point i was like I'm sorry what, they then proceeded to to tell me how they were members of the facebook group and they had seen the post last night and they were really hurt (they sounded more angry but ok) that we were complaining on there and we thought they wouldn't fix the problem they always fix problems like that in 24 hrs, so I was like, whoa, well if you've seen the post you'll know I was talking about your reporting platform and the message generated from that, which distinctly does not say 24hrs it says 3 working days!!!
She then said “well that's what the emergency phone number is for you should have called that as per the tenancy agreement....."we did, 3 times, left two messages one asking the exact question I put on facebook. No one ever got back." Her response was to shut me down and say "we can go round and round on this I don't think there's anything more to say". I was just completely baffled and kept saying what, sorry, I then said look I'm not sure what's happening here...." at which point she slammed and I mean slammed the phone down.
I just feel hair dryer'ed and I do not appreciate that, I mean this is unprofessional right.? Also feel a little spied also who is she to tell me what I can post on Facebook.....I looked at the member list and none of the lettings team are members of that group.
DH has emailed the branch manager asking them to call him - emailed back saying they are on leave today and can't call.....picking up emails and no out of office though 🤔