Heating to 21 degrees?

No legal requirement as far as I’m aware though obviously if the property has insufficient heating and/or insulation then you may need to make certain improvements.
The CIEH Excess Cold guidance states ” heating systems should be capable of heating the whole of the premises so that a temperature in all rooms of 21˚c can be maintained when the external temperature is below freezing point. You can find the guidance by searching on google, it’s worth a look if you’ve not seen it before.

19 degrees is definitely not warm enough and you should get it fixed in any case rather than question whether you have to or not. If it’s gas you’ll need an annual safety certificate so you may as well get a service/repair as well

I had a Tenant that claimed similar, it was in a house that had more than one form of heating, and was usually a hot house.

After spending time and money, changing the pump and flushing the system, I was stumped. The answer was simply that the tenants did not have the heating on long enough.

When they left i heard them happily state to the new tenants that the gas bill was very cheap being only £30 per month in winter.

On my adverts I suggest new tenant should budget for joint Gas and electric of £30 per week in winter.

I also found similar issues with Tenants with electric particularly with storage heaters where despite efforts from myself in how to operate these, yet they put them to one settings and never change them.

When I was a kid, we would dress for the weather, its something that seems to be lost on several generations.

I see Labour wish to let Tenants sue landlords 30k low standards, If such scheme is ever adopted its will be a real recipe for disaster Air BnB here i come.
After all said and done; be a good landlord bite your lip to any chance that your tenant is under using your existing heating and supply enough heaters to toast them.

Kris

The Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992 says that your employer must maintain a reasonable temperature where you work, but it does not specify a maximum temperature. There is a minimum temperature of 16°C, or 13°C if your work involves considerable physical activity.

What a snowflake. When I put my heating on at 19, that’s me being super-extravagant. Often it’s on 17.

Reply to the comment left by Dr Rosalind Beck at 29/10/2018 – 18:16
couldn’t agree more

If you can’t get the temperature up above 19c in this relatively mild weather, then it must be really cold when the temperature gets below freezing.

I had a similar problem today. Check the temperature the boiler is set to. (Ie the water temperature in the radiators) The thermostat in my property was set at 23’c and so was the temperature of the boiler. Setting the boiler temperature to 60’c fixed it.

Reply to the comment left by H B at 29/10/2018 – 18:54
mild -its below zero here

If the boiler has been recently changed to a condensing boiler then this may be the problem. Condensing boilers are designed to operate at lower temperatures than older non-condensing boilers. The dew point is 55 degrees centigrade, which is the maximum return flow temperature for condensation so that extra latent heat from the steam produced by combustion can be released and increase the efficiency of this type of boiler. Assuming a typical 10 degree drop over the total radiators/pipe run the maximum temperature of the boiler should not exceed 65 degrees to ensure the boiler operates at maximum efficiency. It is sometimes necessary to increase radiator sizes when changing the boiler. Sometimes replacing a single panel radiator with a double panel radiator of the same size will suffice. The solution for the poster would be to fit a larger radiator in the living area. I would go for at least double the output of the existing one. Make sure it is fitted with a thermostatic valve so the tenant doesn’t complain that he/she is too hot! By the way, 21 degrees in all rooms is excessive. 18 degrees in bedrooms is recommended as being OK even for old people.