To leave thermostat on when away during holiday?

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Evening all, hope you all had a great Christmas :)
Currently living in a rented ground floor flat which I’m hoping to move out of asap as there is rising damp and it’s very difficult to heat/badly insulated. Even with the heating on for hours the temperature rarely gets to 13 this time of year. After being out of the flat for a week earlier this month, the thermostat was showing 7 degrees 🥶.

I regularly visit family and I’m out of the flat often during the day. I was wondering when away for a few days, should I be leaving the thermostat to a set temperature to avoid frozen pipes and if so what temperature is good? The lowest the thermostat will go down to is 5.5. Would this be enough to avoid them freezing or should it be set to higher?

Previously lived in hot climates so I’m a bit clueless when it comes to these things! Thanks in advance 😊

These are insanely cold temperatures and you should complain to your landlord.

Anything below 18 is dangerous for your health. You’ll get mould, and that’s difficult to get rid of.

I would absolutely leave the thermostat on when away, and try to get the house warmer when home.

My Hive thermostat has a frost protection setting, the default is 7°C. It can be changed, but no lower than 7°.

Thank you both! @LegoDeathTrap I’m definitely going to move asap, already looking but unfortunately there is a shortage of rentals in my area . I moved in the height of summer so didn’t realise how cold it would get.
The thermostat is in the drafty corridor close to the front door, so I do wonder if that’s why the temperatures are showing so low on it.

Also can I ask what temperature do you normally leave the thermostat on when out of the home? :)

My house is old and damp and my boiler is flaky.

I’ve left it on 16 while I’m away for a few days, hoping it will just tick over rather than get freezing.

@LividStrike thanks! Even if I have all radiators on all day it rarely gets to 16 😔Costs a fortune to heat.

Single mum with young dc on uc so I’m at bottom priority to landlords unfortunatly. Hopefully I’ll find somewhere better soon!

Do the other rooms (not the draughty hallway where the thermostat is - so will impact on what temperatureit is reading) get warm when you leave it on all day?

If I am out for the day I set the thermostat to 16, but I can move it’s location so tweak that rather than the temp, if we are away for longer I have a holiday setting which maintains 5c and then resets for the day we are back.

Thanks both :) Ds room and the living room/kitchen do warm up if the doors are all shut but as soon as the heatings switched off it’s back cold 😩Ill start switching the thermostat up when I’m away for more than a day or two :)
Should I be putting the radiators on anti freeze mode too or is that only if the thermostat is switched off?

Also would anyone recommend an oil filled/fan radiator for ds room? Are they safe to have in a toddlers room overnight or is it more cost effective just leaving the radiator on in his room overnight and switch the other room radiators off? My room is cold but I seem to get hot while sleeping so don’t need it switched on in my room. Thanks in advance!

Lived in a similar situation myself and the landlord brought us an oil filled radiator.

Only one we definitely needed two of them because there was no heating at all in this basement flat.
Unbelievable really looking back , it was perishing.
Oil radiators do help keep the chill off. I left it on while I was out at work.

Make sure it's new or been PAT tested.

As to cost, it will depend on what fuel your radiators run off. It your heating is gas it will be cheaper to use that that to run an electric powered oil filled radiator. If your heating is all electric then an oil filled radiator in just one room may be cheaper. As to safety, I would be very careful with a toddler, it would depend to how hot it got.
Yes, you can switch off radiators in rooms you are not using. It may be cheaper (although it's counterintuitive) to run heating in just a few rooms all the time, rather than letting the house get very cold, then trying to blast the heating to warm it up for just a few hours. The fabric of the building will never get warm enough. I would suggest trying leaving it on for a few days and check your meter to see how much energy you have used.

When my dad's house was empty, his insurance company stipulated the thermostat to be set to 10 degrees to prevent frozen pipes.

I think you can complain to the council (environmental health) if privately rented accommodation is poor and unsafe. They can force your landlord to sort it out. There used to be a tv series about it, following the inspectors and filming them. And if the landlord serves an eviction notice the housing department will have to help you either find a more suitable place to rent privately or provide temporary accommodation until social housing becomes available. Years ago now I was placed in temporary accommodation with one large room and a shared bathroom but because it was warm, it felt like heaven!

I Always put in an electric radiator for the little ones. OH and I didn't need one. Ask your landlord to give you a dehumidifier to reduce damp. After all it's the fabric of his house being affected. I speak as a landlord. So tell him another landlord has advised for this reason

Thank you all :) It was my first time renting in UK alone (divorced and xh used to sort out such things before) so was very naive and clueless when moving in 😩

A bit off topic but does this look like rising damp? (Pic attached). It’s been very wet weather here recently and while moving furniture around noticed a damp yellowish patch on the exterior wall in the bedroom and the wallpaper is peeling. (It’s beside large bay window and there’s a gutter directly on the outside). I’ll inform the landlord about it asap.

I ventilate the flat daily when here as well as heat the rooms and wipe any condensation off the windows every morning. I also dry clothes outdoors even in winter and will only put them on an air dryer for an hour with a sheet over beside the radiator to warm them through. Just worried I will be blamed for the damp patch when I do move out.

Thanks again :)