'Fresh hope' for people in Stannington still without heating or cooking facilities
It's following on from a meeting in the Sheffield suburb last week
There's fresh hope for people in an area of Sheffield - who haven't had cooking or heating facilities since December last year.
A water burst flooded the gas main in Stannington - which affected thousands of homes.
After a huge meeting last week - Yorkshire Water & their loss adjustors are basing themselves in the area tomorrow - so locals can speak to them face-to-face.
It's hoped it'll speed up the process for those who're still trying to claim for new boilers or cookers.
Local campaigner Mary Aston lives in the Sheffield suburb:
"We feel like there's a bit of light at the end of the tunnel, I think.
"At least people will be able to speak to somebody.
"If you do manage to get through to the loss adjustors, things can progress quite quickly.
"Within 10-12 days, you can be sorted.
"All the financial dealings will be done between the gas inspectors and the loss adjustors.
"So, that is a positive step. It takes the pressure off everybody just hanging on the end of phones and not getting through.
"When a customer goes in and puts forward their claim, the loss adjustors will consider it and then pass it immediately to the gas inspector.
"The gas inspector can then discuss this with the customer, and arrange a convenient time for them to come along, inspect the product, and then deal with it from there on in."
Cadent Gas provided us with the following statement in response to the latest developments:
“Since the incident in Stannington in December, Cadent has worked to carry out any repairs and/or replacements to gas appliances that were affected. In recent months, there have been around 5,000 visits to homes in Stannington by Cadent gas engineers, and - along with our partner organisation, Aspect - we have completed around 1,500 repairs and replacements.
"From the 1st March it was agreed that we would hand any new referrals for repairs and replacements to Yorkshire Water. Cadent can confirm that we have now completed all of our outstanding repairs and replacements, and all remaining works have now been handed to Yorkshire Water.
"We would also like to reiterate that Cadent paid compensation to residents who were affected by the incident directly to those residents and within a month of the end of the incident. As a gesture of goodwill, Cadent doubled our standard compensation rates for this incident.”
Meanwhile, Yorkshire Water have confirmed that they'll be at Lomas Hall in Stannington tomorrow - along with their loss adjustors - from 11am until 5pm.
In a further statement, Yorkshire Water said:
"We understand how frustrating it must be to still have a damaged gas appliance after the incident in December, and we’re working closely with our loss adjustors, Charles Taylor, to do everything we can to get issues resolved as quickly as possible.
"After Cadent handed over the gas appliance claims to us on 1st March, we’ve been in touch with each customer to establish what support they needed and we’re on with resolving the outstanding issues.
"To help speed up the process, we’ve asked some customers where possible to arrange their own gas safety checks with a gas safe engineer and we will of course reimburse them for this or find an alternative solution if it isn’t possible. We’ll continue to work closely with Cadent and Aspect, and hope to have the remaining appliance issues sorted soon.”