Landlord has made it so I only have hot water at certain times of the day

[Wildrosa]

I’d be so grateful for some advice.

I currently rent, been in the same property almost two years. Last Friday I came home from work and noticed my hot water wasn’t working. I messaged my landlord, he said he’d put on the hot water manually until he could get an electrician out. Yesterday, my landlord messaged, “electrician here setting clock for emersion. What times do you require hot water each day?”. Confused I replied mornings and evenings and then asked if this was temporary. He messaged to say “time clock and power switch were replaced yesterday. Tubes are set daily from 4 - 6am and 6 - 8 pm.”

Am I being unreasonable to think this is ridiculous? I got up early this morning at 7am and had 8 minutes of a lukewarm shower, I’ve come home from a sporting event and the water’s freezing, I’m watching the clock so I can have a hot shower?

Sounds like it's not fixed rather than the timings of the immersion heater

"Hi Landlord,
I think the hot water timer and thermostat may need some fine-tuning.
My shower at 7am was very lukewarm, and I've just come in and there's no hot water right now. Can you please tweak it so I can have hot showers?

Many thanks,
Wildrosa"

Are you sharing the hot water with his family? If so, I’d be up at the crack of dawn having a good long shower.

OK, so it’s not heating properly. It needs fixing, probably nothing to do with the timings.

Annoying as it is I'd try and work with the landlord, or expect a rise in rent.

To be honest, if you're typically having 2 x 8 min hot showers a day he's possibly trying to reduce his energy consumption! The recommendation is that people try to reduce shower time to 3-4 mins which means switching it off while shampooing and soaping etc.

If hot water is mentioned in the lease and included in the rent you pay then you are entitled to hot water.

Any change to hot water availability requires a change to the terms of the lease and a reduction in rent.

Send a letter demanding a new lease and a reduced rent amount to reflect the lack of hot water.

Perhaps he needs to turn the thermostat up?

LL is not liking paying the bills and this rationing ops hot water supply

there is every reason to get decent advice about the matter from an organisation that knows what their talking about

the LLis not being very pleasant

Four hours of hot water a day is loads! We have ours on for an hour and never run out. Presuming you have a system boiler/cylinder combo? That should be enough for hot water all day round.

I guess it's an electric immersion heater? Those are expensive to have on all the time so I'm not surprised he doesn't want to! But maybe you can come up with a schedule to suit you instead of what he's decided.

That's perfectly normal timings for an emersion heater. The water should remain hot in the tank after being heated in the morning. The evening timing is to top up the heat.

To be honest even after being turned off it should remain reasonably warm for a couple of days but will cool gradually as hot water is used and replaced with cold.

Is the tank insulated? Do you share the same tank of water with the landlord - ie they'd already used some by 7am?

It's hugely uneconomical and unnecessary to keep an emersion on all day.

^^ This

From what the OP has said, it's not really clear whether there is a technical problem or the hot water is being used up by someone else, or the landlord is pretending to have the timer on, but isn't.

Clearly, you have a right to a reasonable level of hot water at appropriate times, but this will only be achieved through discussion of what's happening.

Are you aware how much energy bills have increased OP? Every household in the country is trying to minimise cost/wasted energy.

This.

Kick the problem back to the landlord. Do not get involved in discussions about when their timer is on, the point is that you require hot water at normal times of day. It is not for you to advise on their timing/boiler insulation needs.

”Hello. Unfortunately since the electrician came something has gone wrong and there is now no “hot” water at the property in the mornings or mid-evening. There is a small amount of lukewarm water in the morning / early evening but it is not adequate temperature for washing. There is no hot water at all mid-evening. Please advise how you are going to correct this asap as this is obviously unacceptable. If not fixed within 48 hrs please be advised I will have to reduce rent to pay for the cost of washing elsewhere and/or calling out my own electrician if yours is unable to fix this. Be grateful for your urgent attention to this situation.”

It sounds like it's an issue with the heating system, not the timer.
Focus on the fact there is NEVER hot water. 4 hours of heating a day should be plenty to keep the tank full if hot water (as a comparison, we heat for 1 hour a day, and haven't run out unless we all end up doing sport, and have 3 showers and 2 baths out of the tank - the last bath is cold).
So: Dear Landlord, thanks for getting the electrician out so quickly. Unfortunately it doesn't seem to have solved the problem, and there is still no hot water. Can you get someone to have another look. Cheers

"If not fixed within 48 hrs please be advised I will have to reduce rent to pay for the cost of washing elsewhere and/or calling out my own electrician if yours is unable to fix this."

Good luck in getting an electrician out within 48 hours around here!

Don't send this OP if you want to stay in this property. As a tenant you have no right to authorise someone to do electrical work on the property.
Work with the landlord to see how this can be fixed to your (reasonable) satisfaction, rather than just automatically assuming that he's out to shaft you!
Otherwise you may find a rent hike and new contract with bills excluded!

Just raise it with the LL, something along he lines of 'the time for hot water should be ok, but I'm finding that I have no hot water at 7am and at times I need this water such as weekends or now and again during the day I don't have any. I appreciate the cost of living increase, however I do expect to have hot water when I need it, can we have a chat about this please?

"hi LL thanks for trying to sort the hw. sadly it's still not working". that's all it needs at this stage?

No need for a shitogram surely? Just a message saying you don't have any hot water so aren't sure it's been fixed is enough. It sounds like he was prompt in getting the problem dealt with the first time.

If I got a twattish message from a tenant taking about withholding rent and instructing their own engineer about a problem I wasn't aware of that I had acted promptly about previously, I wouldn't be disposed to think kindly of them for the future! No need to believe he's up to anything nefarious surely? It sounds like it's just broken again and he doesn't know.

An immersion heater is a horrifically extensive way to heat water. Back in the days when we had one, we did exactly what your landlord is doing. Having it on all day in financial madness. It does sound as though the water tank isn't insulated enough though.

Is the tank just for your property, or is it shared with the LL who is using all the hot water before you get to it?

It sounds as if he’s turned the water temperature down. But he’s gone too far.
My dh has recently turned ours down from 65c to 60c to see how we managed with a reduction in water temp, we didn’t notice a difference, still plenty of hot water. He’s since turned it to 58, still plenty of hot water.

OP you have not made it clear, is the tank shared with you and the landlord and his family? As if it's shared I'd guess they get up at 6am and all shower and use lots of the hot water leaving little for you. Likewise in the evening are they running baths or washing up from 6-8 such that you have little hot water left for a 9pm shower? If so you need to tell your landlord they are frequently using all the water and he needs to find a solution. Possibly the tank isn't big enough to support their family, plus you as an additional household.
If the tank isn't shared then it's still broken and you need to let LL know.

Boo. Typo in my post. Expensive, not extensive. As I imagine you guessed

I would say though..... You shouldn't need to be showering twice a day (barring medical conditions), especially this time of year when it hasn't been hot sweaty weather. Showering twice a day is sheer waste.

There may not be a hot water tank. Many of the more energy efficient hot water systems are now on demand systems and so only heat the water between certain hours and only if you run the hot water tap during those times.

OP since your rent includes the bills you don’t have much leverage. I’d try and negotiate different times or more time for hot water in return for a bit more rent to cover the higher utility bill it would generate.