Gas Safe 919881 · Bromley
Gas fitting and gas leak repair in Bromley
If you can smell gas right now, stop reading and ring the National Gas Emergency Service on 0800 111 999. It is free, answered 24 hours a day, and it takes priority over everything else on this page.
- Trace and test
- £110 first hour
- Out of hours
- £120, 24/7 across BR
- On completion
- Tightness test certificate
- Gas Safe
- Registration 919881
Get a free quote
Tell us what you need and we’ll come back to you with a price — usually within the hour.
Cost
What it costs
Once the emergency service has been and made the property safe, the supply is usually capped and the gas is off. Getting it back on is a separate job, and it is the one we do: testing the installation, tracing which section is losing pressure, repairing or re-running the pipework, then re-testing, purging and recommissioning every appliance. This page covers that sequence, what it costs in Bromley, and where the network operator’s responsibility ends and yours begins.
| Job | Price | What it involves |
|---|---|---|
| Gas leak trace and test | £110 | First hour on site, including a full tightness test and sectional isolation to find the fault. No separate call-out fee. Most leaks are located inside the hour. |
| Emergency and out-of-hours call-out | £120 | Evenings, weekends and bank holidays, first hour on site. Same rate for a capped supply on a Sunday as for a fault found at eleven at night. |
| Tightness test and certificate | £70 | Standalone test with a written result. Wanted after a house purchase, after building work, or when a meter swap has left the gas refusing to stay on. |
| Gas pipe repair, accessible pipework | from £180 | A joint, a compression fitting or a corroded section in a cupboard, under a suspended floor or in a garage. Includes the re-test and recommissioning. |
| Gas pipe re-run under a solid floor | from £480 | Buried steel abandoned in place, both ends capped, new copper run above floor or through the void and sleeved through walls. The Petts Wood and Coney Hall job. |
| Supply upgrade, 15mm to 22mm | from £340 | Where the existing 15mm run from the meter cannot hold working pressure for a modern boiler. Priced on the length and how much of it is accessible. |
| Cooker or hob connection | £90 | Disconnect and reconnect on an existing gas point, bayonet or rigid, stability bracket where required, tightness test on completion. |
| New gas point for an appliance | from £220 | A spur for a hob, a gas fire or an outdoor kitchen, taken off the existing installation with its own isolation valve. |
What changes the price
Whether the pipe is reachable
A leak on a visible joint in an under-stairs cupboard is an hour. The same leak on steel buried in the screed of a 1930s solid floor is most of a day, because the pipe cannot be repaired where it lies. This one variable is why quotes for a gas leak run from under £200 to well over £800.
How many sections have to be isolated
Finding a leak means dividing the installation and re-testing each part. One boiler and a hob divides quickly. A hob, a gas fire, a loft boiler and a capped leg where a back boiler used to be takes considerably longer to narrow down.
Sleeving through walls and floors
Gas pipe passing through a cavity wall or a solid floor has to be sleeved, with the sleeve sealed at one end only. Doing that is the honest reason a quote lands above a headline £77, and skipping it is why a cheap repair fails its next inspection.
Age and material of the run
Older Bromley stock still carries iron and early steel. Once one corroded section has gone, the rest of that run is on the same clock, and a patch on it is a false economy. We will say so rather than take the smaller job twice.
Out of hours, and appliances to recommission
A capped supply at nine on a February Sunday is £120 for the first hour, published rather than decided on the doorstep. After the repair the installation is purged and every appliance relit and checked, so four gas appliances take longer to bring back than a combi and nothing else.
The bit nobody explains
What the free 0800 111 999 visit does, and where it stops
Ring the National Gas Emergency Service and an engineer attends free, usually within the hour. Their job is to make the property safe. They establish that gas is escaping, isolate it, and if it is on your side of the meter they cap the supply, hand you a warning notice and leave. They do not repair your pipework and they will not turn the gas back on. That is where a Gas Safe registered engineer picks the job up, and it is the part every competing page leaves out. The reason for the split is ownership.
| Part of the system | Whose responsibility | What that means in practice |
|---|---|---|
| The main in the street | Network operator | Bromley’s BR postcodes sit in the Southern Gas Networks distribution area rather than Cadent’s north Thames network. Either way a leak here is repaired free, and you pay nothing. |
| The service pipe to the property | Network operator | The buried pipe from the main to your meter position. Still the operator’s, still free, still reported on 0800 111 999. |
| The emergency control valve | Network operator | The ECV is the lever handle at the meter and it is the legal boundary. It is the valve you turn a quarter turn, handle across the pipe, if you smell gas. |
| The meter | Your gas supplier | Owned by whoever bills you, or by a meter asset provider on their behalf. A leaking meter connection goes through the emergency line and is dealt with by the supplier, not by us. |
| All pipework after the ECV | The property owner | Every metre from the outlet of that valve onward is yours: the run to the boiler, the spur to the hob, the drop to the fire. This is what we test, trace and repair, and the reason the free visit ends with the gas off. |
| The appliances | The property owner | Boiler, hob, fire, cooker and their connections. A leak at an appliance isolation valve or a flexible hose is yours, and in a rented property it is the landlord’s. |
The tightness test, properly explained
We isolate at the ECV, connect a manometer at a test point and bring the installation to its test pressure. After a stabilisation period the pressure is watched over a standard two-minute test period. The permitted drop depends on the meter and the pipework volume, and anything beyond it means the installation has failed and gas is escaping. It is not a judgement call. It is a number read off a gauge, and it is the same number before and after any repair.
Let-by, and why it comes first
Before the tightness test comes a let-by test, checking whether the emergency control valve is itself passing gas when it should be shut. If the ECV is letting by, every reading after it is meaningless, and a failing valve is a network matter rather than ours. Nobody ranking for this search mentions let-by at all, which tells you something about who is writing the published advice.
The warning notice you sign
Under the Gas Industry Unsafe Situations Procedure an unsafe installation is classified either Immediately Dangerous, meaning a danger to life now, or At Risk, meaning it will be if it is used. The notice you sign acknowledges the classification and gives permission to disconnect. It does not admit fault or commit you to a repair with anyone in particular. Refusing to sign changes nothing: the refusal is logged, the appliance is still labelled, and an Immediately Dangerous situation is still reported.
Purging and recommissioning
A repair is not finished when the pipe stops leaking. Air has to be purged from the installation, every appliance relit and checked, ignition and pilots confirmed, and the boiler run up and its working pressure verified. We do that as part of the job, so you are left with a working house rather than a repaired pipe and four appliances to sort out.
If you smell gas, in this order
Open doors and windows. Turn the gas off at the emergency control valve by the meter. Do not touch light switches, plugs, a doorbell or anything else electrical, because the risk is the spark rather than the switch. No naked flames and no smoking. Take a mobile outside before using it. Ring 0800 111 999 from outside. Do not go back in until you are told it is safe. Opening windows genuinely helps: natural gas is lighter than air and disperses upward, which is why the same leak is far more dangerous in a sealed cupboard than in a ventilated hallway.
Local
What gas pipework in Bromley actually looks like
The borough splits into two housing types that leak in completely different ways, plus a third complication in the flats. Knowing which one you are in tells you most of what the repair will cost before anyone has arrived.
Interwar semis: Petts Wood, Crofton, Coney Hall, Hayes
Metroland stock from the 1920s and 1930s, typically with the original steel gas run buried in a solid ground floor and taken to a hob or a fire in the middle of the house. Buried steel corrodes from the outside in, under a screed nothing can be seen through. It is the most expensive class of leak in the borough, because the answer is not a repair: the buried section is abandoned, both ends capped, and new copper run above floor or around the perimeter, sleeved through walls. From £480, and cheaper than chasing the old pipe through a floor.
Victorian terraces and conversions: Penge, Anerley, central Bromley
Pipework in ceiling voids and under suspended timber, often extended two or three times as the house was divided. We find capped legs behind plasterboard from removed gas fires, undersized 15mm feeding a boiler that wants 22mm, and joints made during a 1970s conversion nobody has looked at since. The advantage is access: lifting a board beats breaking a floor, and these usually land between £180 and £350.
Flats and shared risers: town centre, Penge, Anerley
Gas typically comes up a communal riser to a meter cupboard on the landing, then into each flat. The riser is normally the freeholder’s under the lease and the pipework inside your front door is yours, but leases vary and it is worth reading yours before work starts. Where the leak is in the communal section we will tell you, and put it in writing for the managing agent rather than quote for work that is not yours to pay for.
Conservation areas: five in Petts Wood alone
Bromley has 47 designated conservation areas, the fifth highest count in London. Station Square, The Chenies and Chislehurst Road cover much of Petts Wood; Chislehurst, Keston Village, Keston Park, Farnborough Park, Chelsfield, Shortlands, Bickley Park, Sundridge Avenue and Park Langley are among the rest. It matters here in two specific ways. A flue terminal on a principal or road-facing elevation can attract planning scrutiny, and a surface-run external gas riser up a front or side elevation is exactly the visible addition these designations exist to control. Where an Article 4 direction applies, permitted development rights covering minor external work have been withdrawn. None of it stops the job. It changes where the pipe and the flue go, and it is far better settled before we start than after.
Back boiler legacies in the Crays and Ramsden
St Mary Cray, St Paul’s Cray and Ramsden have a lot of houses where a back boiler was removed and the gas leg capped in the chimney breast rather than taken back to a live tee. Those caps are decades old and usually behind plaster, and they are a common cause of a failed tightness test on a property that has had no gas work done in years. If your test fails and nothing has changed, that is the first place we look. We cover Bromley BR1 to BR8, plus Penge, Sydenham and Crystal Palace, out of hours every day of the year.
The job
How it works
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Make safe first
If the supply is still on and there is a smell of gas, it goes off at the emergency control valve before anything else. If the emergency service has already capped it, we start from there. Nothing gets tested with an escape running.
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Let-by, then tightness test the whole installation
A manometer goes on at a test point. We confirm the emergency control valve is not letting by, bring the installation to test pressure, let it stabilise and read the drop over the standard test period. That single reading tells us whether there is a leak and roughly how large, before anything has been opened up.
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Divide the installation and trace the fault
Appliances are isolated one at a time and each section re-tested, halving the search at every step. Once we have the section, an electronic detector and leak detection fluid find the joint. Where the run is buried, we work out the shortest compliant new route rather than chase a pipe we cannot reach.
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Repair or re-run, priced before we do it
You get the number before the work happens, not on the invoice. A joint remade or a section replaced in copper, properly clipped, sleeved where it passes through a wall or floor, sleeve sealed at one end so any escape vents where it can be seen.
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Re-test, purge, relight, certificate
The same tightness test is repeated and has to pass. The installation is purged, every appliance relit and checked, working pressure and gas rate confirmed at the boiler, and you get the result in writing. That document is what matters if you ever have to prove the installation was sound.
Included
What comes as standard
- Let-by and tightness test on the whole installation, not just the suspect section
- Sectional isolation to locate the fault rather than guesswork
- Electronic gas detection and leak detection fluid
- Written test result and certificate on completion
- Pipe clipped and sleeved through walls and floors, sleeve sealed one end
- Full purge and recommissioning of every gas appliance in the property
- Working pressure and gas rate checked at the boiler
- Any unsafe situation classified and explained in writing before it is disconnected
- Gas Safe registration 919881 shown on the invoice
- 12-month guarantee on our workmanship
Questions
Gas fitting & leak repair questions
Are gas leaks fixed for free?
Only if the leak is on the network side. In the main, the service pipe, or up to the emergency control valve at your meter, the network operator repairs it free and you pay nothing. Everything downstream of that valve belongs to the property owner, and that is where most domestic leaks are. The free 0800 111 999 visit finds the escape, isolates it and caps your supply, but it does not repair your pipework and will not turn the gas back on. The repair, the re-test and getting the appliances working again are chargeable, and for us that starts at £110 for the first hour, with no separate call-out fee.
Can you fix a gas leak yourself?
No, and it is not a matter of skill. Under the Gas Safety (Installation and Use) Regulations, work on a gas fitting or appliance has to be carried out by a Gas Safe registered engineer. Doing it yourself is a criminal offence, it invalidates your home insurance, and an untested repair on a gas pipe is the kind of thing that causes an incident months later. The only gas work you may legally do is turning the supply off at the emergency control valve, which you should do if you smell gas.
Will a carbon monoxide detector detect a gas leak?
No, and it is the most dangerous misunderstanding we come across. A carbon monoxide alarm detects CO, a product of incomplete combustion from an appliance burning badly. It does not detect natural gas, and a leak from a pipe or a joint will not set one off however large it is. You want both: a CO alarm near your gas appliances, and a natural gas detector if you want an audible warning of an escape. The odorant in the gas is the only warning most households have, and it does not help if you are asleep.
What smell can be mistaken for a gas leak?
Natural gas is odourless, so mercaptan is added to give it the rotten-egg smell people recognise. Several household things come close enough to cause a false alarm: a dry drain trap under a rarely used utility sink, rotting food behind a fridge, a dead mouse under floorboards, sewer gas from a failed soil vent, and some paints, adhesives and cat urine. Treat all of them as gas until proven otherwise. Ring 0800 111 999, let an engineer establish it is not gas, and accept twenty minutes of embarrassment. It costs nothing.
Can a small gas leak make you ill, and can it go unnoticed?
Yes to both. Natural gas is not toxic, but in an enclosed space it displaces oxygen, which brings headaches, drowsiness, dizziness and nausea that lift when you leave the house and return when you go back in. That pattern is the giveaway. A small escape under a suspended floor can persist for months without reaching a smellable concentration in the rooms you use. Other signs worth checking are a lazy yellow flame instead of a crisp blue one, sooty marks around an appliance, and dead vegetation directly above a buried gas run in the garden.
How long should you stay out of the house after a gas leak?
Until the attending engineer says it is safe. Once the supply is isolated and the property ventilated that is usually an hour or two rather than days, because natural gas is lighter than air and clears upward through open windows. What does not return quickly is the gas supply itself: if it has been capped it stays off until the installation is repaired and has passed a fresh tightness test.
How much does it cost to fix a gas leak in the UK?
Nationally, Checkatrade puts average labour around £200 in a range of £77 to £920, which is wide because the jobs genuinely are. In Bromley our figures are £110 for the first hour to trace and test, £70 for a standalone tightness test, from £180 for a repair on accessible pipework, and from £480 where a buried run under a solid floor has to be abandoned and re-run. The £77 end of the national range is a joint remade in a cupboard. The £900 end is a full re-run in a house where the original pipe is set in concrete. Most Bromley repairs land between £180 and £400.
How long does it take to fix a gas leak?
Tracing is usually under an hour, because the tightness test tells us immediately whether there is a leak and sectional isolation narrows it down fast. An accessible repair is typically one to three hours including the re-test, the purge and relighting the appliances. A re-run under a solid floor, or a supply upgrade from the meter, is most of a day. We would rather tell you it is a day than start it as a two-hour job and leave you without gas overnight.
Who is responsible if there is a gas leak in a rented property?
The landlord. Gas pipework, flues and any appliance the landlord provides have to be maintained in a safe condition and checked annually by a Gas Safe engineer, with a CP12 gas safety record issued to the tenant. If a leak is found during that check, the engineer classifies the situation as Immediately Dangerous or At Risk and, with permission, disconnects the affected part. No certificate is issued for a failed installation: the repair happens first, then the check is completed and the CP12 issued. A tenant left without gas meanwhile should be told how long it will take, and the landlord carries the cost. We carry out landlord checks at £75 and will repair and re-issue in the same visit where the parts allow.
Can I test for a gas leak myself?
You can do the crude version safely. Washing-up liquid and water brushed onto a visible joint will bubble if gas is escaping. Never use a naked flame, and never on a joint you cannot see. What you cannot do is the test that actually matters, which is a manometer reading on the whole installation with the supply isolated at the emergency control valve. That reading is the only way to establish whether there is an escape anywhere in the system, including the parts under your floor, and it is the document that proves the installation is sound afterwards.
Coverage
Where we work
Across the London Borough of Bromley — BR1 to BR7 — plus Penge, Sydenham and Crystal Palace.
No heating? No hot water?
Get a fixed price from a Gas Safe registered engineer — not an answering service. Same-day appointments across Bromley most days.