If you smell gas, stop reading and act
Do not operate any switch, plug, doorbell or light, and do not use a phone inside the building. Turn the gas off at the meter if you can reach it safely, open the windows, get everyone out, and call the emergency gas service or 112 from outside. Only contact us once the gas service has made the property safe. The same applies to a smell of burning, smoke, or soot marks around the boiler casing.
Photograph the code before you reset
Most boilers show a fault code on the display. Photograph it first. Resetting clears the code, and a boiler that has been reset five times tells a technician far less than one photo of the original fault. If the boiler locks out again straight after a reset, stop resetting — a repeated lockout is a protection device doing its job, not a glitch.
Read the pressure gauge
Find the pressure gauge on the front or underside of the boiler and note the reading while the system is cold. Most domestic systems sit around 1 to 1.5 bar. A reading near zero often explains a boiler that will not fire, and a gauge that keeps falling week after week points to a leak somewhere in the system. Photograph the gauge and tell us the number rather than repressurising repeatedly — the refill hides the real fault.
Note which half of the system fails
Hot water at the taps but cold radiators, or warm radiators but no hot water, narrows the cause dramatically. Before you call, check that the room thermostat is calling for heat, that any programmer or timer is set for the current hour, and that the radiator valves are open. In summer, a heating fault often goes unnoticed until autumn — worth testing before the season starts.
Check the condensate pipe in cold weather
Condensing boilers drain through a plastic pipe that often runs outside. In a Tbilisi cold snap it can freeze and shut the boiler down, usually with a specific code. If you can see the pipe from a safe position at ground level, note whether it is frozen or blocked. Do not climb, lean out of a window, or work at height to inspect it, and do not pour boiling water over pipework.
Record what we will ask for anyway
Have the make and model from the label on the boiler casing, the exact fault code, the pressure reading, when the problem began, whether it is intermittent or constant, and the date of the last service. Photos of the display and the gauge, plus a short video of any unusual noise, will often let us bring the right part on the first visit.