Boiler and Heating Engineer in Chorleywood
Heating Engineers in Chorleywood
Local, Gas Safe registered boiler and heating engineer covering Chorleywood and the surrounding area. Fixed prices, no call-out fee and a one year guarantee.
Information on this page last reviewed September 2026.
Gas Safe heating engineers covering Chorleywood
Home Comfort Assured is a small Watford heating firm covering Chorleywood and WD3. Andrew and Elis do the jobs themselves. We are Gas Safe registered under number 586325, there is no call-out fee and no charge for quoting, and the person who prices your job is the person who does it.
Boiler repairs, servicing, replacements and cylinder work are most of what we are asked for here. Ring 07970 632 064 and tell us what the system is doing.
What we do here
- Hot water cylinders, vented and unvented, sized to the bathroom count
- System boilers where a combi cannot keep up
- Secondary return pipework, so the far tap is not a wait
- Zoning a large house so you are not heating empty rooms
- Boiler repairs and fault finding
- Annual servicing, with a written report
- New boilers and replacements
- Underfloor heating
- General plumbing
What we do
Our services in Chorleywood
Boiler repairs and servicing
Breakdowns, fault finding, annual servicing and replacement, on every major brand.
Read moreCentral heating
Radiators, valves, controls, power flushing and full system installation.
Read morePlumbing
Leaks and burst pipes, taps, cylinders, bathrooms and appliance installation.
Read moreUnderfloor heating
Design, installation and repair, wet systems in new builds and retrofits.
Read moreViessmann boilers
Why we are accredited, what the range does well, and how it compares.
Read moreLocal knowledge
Why Chorleywood customers call us
Chorleywood Common: a chimney rule
The Common has been a conservation area since 1976, and its Article 4(2) direction means residents must apply for planning permission to alter chimneys, in the council's own words. It names chimneys, not flues, so we treat a flue route as a separate question to be checked per address.
Voysey's Orchard, Grade I
C.F.A. Voysey's own house on Shire Lane, built 1899 to 1900, is the town's Grade I building. The Station Estate conservation area, designated in 2005, is described in the council's appraisal as early surviving Hertfordshire Metroland, with bold chimneys among its defining features.
69.4% detached in Chorleywood North
Nearly seven in ten homes in Chorleywood North & Sarratt ward are detached, against 23.2% nationally, and 48.2% of households own outright. The southern ward is far more mixed at 39.1% detached, so the two halves of town need different conversations.
The Chilterns National Landscape
Chorleywood Common sits within the Chilterns, and national rules withdraw the permitted development right for a flue on the principal or side elevation facing a highway on such land. Whether a particular address falls inside the boundary has to be checked for that address.
About 4% off the gas grid in the north
In Chorleywood North & Sarratt, 2.9% of households heat with oil only and 1.1% with bottled or tank gas, 107 homes in all. The ward includes semi-rural Sarratt, which is where this almost certainly sits, and we are gas engineers who do not work on oil or LPG.
Clay under the topsoil
A 2014 Hertfordshire County Council report on flooding at Green Street found clay beneath the topsoil giving poor infiltration. It flooded a road that was closed for long periods, and the report states that no properties were directly affected.
On the ground
Areas we cover in Chorleywood
We cover WD3.
Chorleywood
WD3The town itself, WD3 5, in Chorleywood parish. The station opened in July 1889, so the building history here starts well before Croxley Green's.
Chorleywood Common and the Station Estate
WD3Two separate conservation areas with different histories, the Common from 1976 and the Voysey-influenced Station Estate from 2005. Only the Common's Article 4(2) direction is confirmed to cover chimneys.
Chorleywood Bottom and Chorleywood West
WD3Both sit in the South & Maple Cross ward, the half of town that is a third semi-detached and where 14.8% of households rent socially.
Heronsgate
WD3An unparished area rather than part of Chorleywood parish, in the same South & Maple Cross ward.
Sarratt
WD3Its own parish, in the North & Sarratt ward, and the likely home of the ward's oil and bottled gas households. We cover the mains gas homes here.
Maple Cross
WD3Also unparished, in the South & Maple Cross ward, at the WD3 9 end of the district.
Chorleywood has three sets of rules about chimneys, not one
Most towns have one planning layer to think about. Chorleywood has three overlapping ones, and they catch different things. This is the part of working here that a firm from outside the district gets wrong.
One: the conservation area. Chorleywood Common was designated a conservation area in 1976, with a boundary amendment in 1991.
Two: an Article 4 direction that names chimneys. The council's own wording is that an Article 4(2) Direction applies in the Chorleywood Common conservation area, so residents "must apply for planning permission for certain alterations that were previously permitted, including alterations to windows, chimneys, front boundaries and hardstanding". The appraisal explains the reasoning: the original timber windows and features "such as the chimneys, play an important role in maintaining the historic architectural features of the Conservation Area".
Three: the Chilterns National Landscape. Chorleywood Common lies within it, and on that land the national permitted development rules separately remove the right to fit a flue that fronts a highway on the principal or side elevation. Whether a particular address falls inside the boundary needs an address-level check, so we check rather than assume.
Two things follow that are worth being precise about.
The Article 4 says chimneys, not flues. Those are different questions with different answers, and blurring them either frightens people unnecessarily or misses a permission they actually need. A flue is governed by the national position, because Three Rivers publishes no flue wording of its own.
And the district is not uniform. Croxley Green a few miles away has no Article 4 restricting chimneys at all. People compare notes with friends in the next town and reach the wrong conclusion.
We treat the flue and chimney route as part of the survey and tell you where you stand before you have committed to anything.
Voysey, and why the chimney is part of the house
The Chorleywood Station Estate conservation area, designated in 2005, is built around the influence of the architect C.F.A. Voysey. His own house, The Orchard on Shire Lane, is Grade I listed and dates from 1899 to 1900. The council's appraisal calls the estate "an excellent example of early surviving Hertfordshire Metroland".
The features the appraisal names as defining are worth knowing before anyone puts a flue through a wall: long, steeply pitched roofs, crows-feet eaves brackets, roughcast render, and bold chimneys. On Berks Hill it lists "prominent chimneys" among the important traditional materials, alongside clay tiles, natural slate and timber windows.
On a house like that the chimney is not a leftover. It is one of the things the designation exists to protect, which changes the conversation about where a new appliance vents and whether an unused stack can be taken down or altered.
Big houses, long ownership, and what that means for a system
Chorleywood North and Sarratt is 69.4% detached, three times the national rate and second only to Moor Park across our patch. 48.2% of households own their home outright, the highest figure anywhere we work.
Those two numbers together describe the jobs. Large houses with several bathrooms, owned a long time, with heating systems that have usually been extended rather than redesigned.
The recurring problem is hot water rather than heat. A combi can only heat water as fast as the mains delivers it, so in a house with two or three bathrooms running at once it will disappoint however big it is. A system boiler with a correctly sized cylinder is normally the better answer, and on a long house it is worth asking about a secondary return so the far tap does not run cold for a while first. We measure the incoming flow rate at the stopcock before recommending anything.
The town is not uniformly grand, though, and it would be wrong to pitch it that way. The Maple Cross end has a very different profile, with more social housing and smaller properties, and the same firm covers both.
Hard water, and why there is no number here
Affinity Water supplies Chorleywood, and their own description of their whole area is that the water is hard. It is.
We will not quote you a figure, and the reason is honest rather than evasive. Affinity does not publish which supply zone covers this town, and Chorleywood sits between three of them reading 283, 300 and 325 mg/l. That is a real gap and choosing one would be a guess. Affinity's own postcode lookup gives the reading for your address.
Scale does what scale does regardless: it settles on the hot side of a heat exchanger, inside a cylinder and around an immersion element. In a town of large houses with big cylinders there is simply more surface for it to gather on, and the first sign is usually reheat times creeping up rather than anything failing. We fit scale protection on new installations and will tell you when it is not worth adding to an existing system.
Gas, and where we have to say no
We are gas engineers. We do not service or install oil boilers or LPG.
That matters at the edges of this ward. Around 4% of households in Chorleywood North and Sarratt heat with oil or bottled gas, and that is almost certainly the Sarratt end rather than Chorleywood itself, where the mains gas share is 80.4%. If you are one of those households we are not the right firm, and we would rather tell you here than take the call and disappoint you.
If you are on mains gas anywhere in Chorleywood, Chorleywood Bottom, Chorleywood West or the Common side, we cover you.
Ground and drainage
One properly documented local fact rather than a general one. When Green Street flooded repeatedly in the winters of 2012 to 2014, Hertfordshire County Council investigated it formally and found the cause was surface water pooling in a dip in the road, with clay beneath the topsoil giving poor infiltration so the water had nowhere to go.
No properties were flooded, which the report says plainly, and it would be wrong to suggest otherwise. The useful part is the ground: clay that does not drain well is worth knowing about when anyone is thinking about soakaways, surface water or where a condensate run should discharge.
Who turns up
Andrew Millward, founder. Forty years in the trade, Viessmann accredited and a Heat Geek Elite, and the one to send at a fault nobody else has pinned down. Elis Harizi, director, in the trade since 2007 and a Heat Geek member, who does most of our installation, cylinder and underfloor work. No subcontractors.
We are Viessmann accredited and it is the brand we recommend most often, but we service and install every major make and we are not paid to prefer one.
How we work
- No call-out fee, no charge for quoting
- A fixed price agreed before the work starts
- One year guarantee on our workmanship
- Monday to Friday 8am to 9pm, Saturday and Sunday 9am to 5pm
Around Chorleywood
We also work in Rickmansworth and Croxley Green next door, and over towards Chalfont St Peter. The full range of heating work is on our heating page.
To book a service, get a fault looked at or get a price for a replacement, call Andrew or Elis on 07970 632 064.
Need us in Chorleywood?
Call and speak to the engineer who will do the work, or ask for a quote. No call-out fee, and a one year guarantee on what we do in Chorleywood.
Step by step
Booking a heating engineer in Chorleywood
Chorleywood has more planning layers than most towns, so the address decides a lot.
Call and tell us what the system does
Ring 07970 632 064 and describe the fault or the job. You speak to Andrew or Elis, and the person who quotes is the person who does the work.
Give us the road and the fuel
We ask for the road because the answer differs between the Common, the Station Estate and the rest of the town, and for the fuel because we are gas engineers and do not work on oil or LPG.
We check the chimney and flue position first
If the house is on the Common, near the Station Estate or possibly inside the Chilterns boundary, we look at what applies to that address before anyone quotes a flue route. There is no call-out fee and no charge for quoting.
The work
Andrew or Elis does the job themselves.
Common questions
Do I need planning permission to alter a chimney in Chorleywood?
Around the Common, quite possibly, and this is the thing people get wrong. Three Rivers District Council's own wording is that an Article 4(2) Direction applies in the Chorleywood Common conservation area, meaning residents must apply for planning permission for certain alterations that were previously permitted, including alterations to windows, chimneys, front boundaries and hardstanding. Note it says chimneys. The council's appraisal explains why: the chimneys play an important role in maintaining the historic architectural features of the area. Croxley Green a few miles away has no such restriction, so do not assume a neighbour's experience applies to you.
Is a flue the same thing as a chimney for planning purposes?
Not quite, and the distinction matters here. The Common's Article 4 direction names chimneys. A flue is governed separately, and Three Rivers publishes no wording of its own about flues, so the national permitted development position applies. There is a further layer if your address is in the Chilterns National Landscape, because on that land the national rules remove the permitted development right for a flue that fronts a highway on the principal or side elevation. Whether a specific address falls inside that boundary needs checking. We work the flue route out at the survey rather than guessing.
My house has the tall chimneys and the steep roof. Does that change anything?
It might. The Chorleywood Station Estate conservation area is built around the influence of the architect C.F.A. Voysey, whose own house, The Orchard on Shire Lane, is Grade I listed and dates from 1899. The council's appraisal lists bold chimneys among the estate's defining features, alongside long steeply pitched roofs and the Voysey heart motif. On a house like that the chimney is part of what is protected, so where a flue terminates and whether a stack can be altered are real questions rather than details.
How hard is the water here?
Hard, but we will not quote you a figure. Affinity Water supplies Chorleywood and does not publish which supply zone covers it, and the town sits between three whose readings run from 283 to 325 mg/l. That gap is too wide to pick from honestly. Affinity's own line is that its whole supply area has hard water, which is true here, and their postcode lookup gives the number for your address. Practically it means scale in cylinders and heat exchangers is worth designing around.
We are on oil out towards Sarratt. Can you help?
Honestly, no. We are gas engineers and we do not service or install oil boilers. Around 4% of households in the Chorleywood North and Sarratt ward heat with oil or bottled gas, and that is almost certainly the Sarratt end rather than Chorleywood itself. If you are on oil we are not the right firm and we would rather say so than waste your call. If you are on mains gas anywhere in Chorleywood, we are.
Are you Gas Safe registered?
Yes, registration number 586325. You can check it on the Gas Safe Register before we visit, and the engineer will carry their card.
Recent work nearby
See more of our work
What our customers say
See more reviews on TrustATraderReally good service from an excellent plumber. So helpful, and a clean and tidy professional job. Would definitely recommend.
Elis is a real professional plumber. He arrived on time and carried out the agreed annual boiler service. Thank you!
Andrew is the best and showed it with his installation of my boiler. A complicated job that very few people would have completed as well as him. Andrew is extremely knowledgeable and highly skilled. Would not hesitate to recommend.
Meet your engineers
The engineers who turn up
Two engineers, both Gas Safe registered under registration 586325. When you book Home Comfort Assured, this is who does the work.
Andrew Millward
Founder and heating engineer
- 40+ years experience
- Heat Geek Elitist
- Viessmann accredited
Andrew has over 40 years in the trade and specialises in fault finding, boiler and heating repairs, and the design of energy efficient systems like heat pumps and underfloor heating.
Andrew on YouTube
Elis Harizi
Director and plumbing & heating engineer
- Plumbing since 2007
- Heat Geek member
- Gas qualified
Elis trained as a plumber in Greece in 2007, moved to England to gain his gas qualifications, and now designs and installs energy efficient heating as a Heat Geek member.
Got a job that needs sorting?
Call and speak to an engineer, or request a quote. No call-out fee, and we work across Hertfordshire and south Buckinghamshire.