David Pashley wrote:

Anyway, it's the lack of HW that's the main
problem, and I doubt any of us are ancient enough to predate that
amenity.

Depends on what you mena by predate... As a kid our house had no CH (did
not get it until the mid 80's). HW was from an immersion heater that was
very expensive to run in a huge uninsulated cylinder. Hence it was
switched on for only one or two nights a week to provide bathing
facilities. The following day warm water was available, other days it
was cold. At the time it did not seem unusual or a big hardship,
although I would not want to go back to not having hot water on demand,
lack of it is hardly life threatening.

Also, I didn't raise the fact that we have a baby in order to engender
sympathy or some sort of discount, but initially to emphasize the
urgency of the situation, and subsequently to point out that I will not
be exploited by "professionals" who think it's OK to charge more
because of this vulnerability.

ISTM that babies are not so much of a problem - they are easy to dress
warm, and to bath them does not take much hot water.


No offennce intended, but It sounds to me as if you prefessional quoted
you a resonable price for the work. Perhaps you have been mislead into
believeing that doing this job is somehow quick and easy.

I would expect the work will amount to several days if done well and
carefully.

In practice, we will get by for as long as it takes to find a
fairly-priced solution. My main objective in posting was to find out
what the experienced people here think is fair.

In your situation, and doing a good job I would expect something like 4
man days worth of work. You can probably convert that to a currency
amount for you local area.

--
Cheers,

John.

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