What if your government threatens you with infecting you?

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This might sound like I'm deluded, and I wish I was, but I think this is really the case of inmates running the asylum... and while countries doing nothing to stop the virus from spreading is bad enough, my local one literally is threatening to take legal action unless I open the door to some random person to check the boiler and risk being infected. I'm threatening to kill them in self defence if they barge in, but surely they can't charge me with murder if they're instigating it in the first place?! I feel so suffocated...

A boiler safety check is pretty important ( if you rent it might be a legal requirement ).

Faulty boilers can kill.

Can you implement a regime that would make you feel safer if someone enters your house?

Most workers that enter my home will wear a face mask when they enter. It is a form of courtesy. They are trying to keep the homeowner safe. So if someone comes to perform a boiler safety check, it would seem logical to ask them to don a mask if they are not already wearing one. That should provide you some measure of safety for their visit.

One possibility is that if you threaten the person performing the inspection. He may simple turn of the fuel that feeds the boiler. If it is an especially cold winter, it might result in you freezing to death over the winter. The most likely thing that will happen is that it will spur a visit by the police.

As long as you stay 6 feet away or have the other person wear a mask, you should be completely safe. To be safe when you open the door, you can back away right after opening it. Even if you didn't take any precautions and got infected, it's not a big deal since it's barely more deadly than the seasonal flu (The WHO recently lowered the mortality rate to 0.6% which isn't much higher than mortality from seasonal flu which is 0.1%. The odds of dying of Covid-19 is the same as the odds of dying if you got the seasonal flu 6 times). If you threaten the worker, there's a good chance you'll end up in jail where your risk will be much higher (70% have been infected in many jails).

A faulty boiler can do way worse than kill you. Long term exposure to the fumes can cause permanent damage and leave you physically disabled.

Nobody is forcing themselves in my house! How the heck do you even manage to argue with this kind of logic?! I thought houses are the last sanctuary of people! If I can't let in only who I want to let in then what, can I 'legally' be obliged to have a covid party?! Oh, me miss, how about to be obliged to jump off a cliff!

What nonsense... and I'm not at risk of the boiler if I switch it off. This is just brilliant, honestly... I never requested to have a boiler, and now they might infect me with something I never requested.

Absolute nonsense. And no, they can have a mask but everything around them could still have viral particles, which could be transmitted to surfaces. This is only slightly less bad than letting in a tank.

But I can't believe that people on an autism forum wouldn't be aghast at this... one would think that, desiring to be by one's own (self'ism), you'd understand...

I can understand why this has upset you. One's home is a sanctuary and it isn't nice to have other people in it. That said, sometimes it is necessary.

The risk is very low, and is clearly rather different to being forced to host a COVID party. You can always disinfect the nearby surfaces afterwards if you are really concerned.

I think some of your extreme thoughts here are not quite proportionate or rational. I promise it won't be as bad as you are imagining. There is no reason for you to be threatening people who are just trying to help you. I would advise you to talk these feelings through with a mental health professional if you have access.

A boiler is certainly an essential item (it provides you with both heating and hot water) and it needs to be properly maintained.

if its your house ( i.e you are not renting ) then it's your rules ( UK rules , maybe different elsewhere )

why do a boiler inspection company believe they have the right to gain entry using legal action , is it their boiler , is there a contract.

Enjoy your stay in jail where you will most likely get infected.



I never said it was right. I just said that letting someone into your house, if required by law, is safer than threatening the person and going to jail. If you rent, it's not your house which means the landlord may have a legal right to enter in some situations to protect his property. Even if you have a right to refuse entry, you may risk getting evicted and ending up homeless. If you rent, I'd contact the landlord and tell them how you feel to see if you can work out a solution.

a valid point but I would have worded it in a more helpful and de-escalating way as this is a help forum after all

A note that in the UK it is a legal requirement to have a boiler safety certificate in rented properties. This must be done yearly and big fines or prison await those that don't do this.

I absolutely understand that it is your home and the "this is my space and you shouldn't be here" concept. I think you need to calm down and try to understand that if this space is unsafe you yourself then become unsafe in it. Turning off the boiler WON'T make this go away.

My OCD is in regards to contamination of my things by other people so anyone coming into my home is a huge stress.

I am not worried about covid in particular as getting ill is not part of my OCD but I do understand the lack of control and the panic.

Which country are you in?

Do you own your home?

Who exactly is saying that they are coming to check the boiler and on who's behalf are they doing this (who is paying them)?

I have had threats of someone coming in my house from the TV licencing authority (bloody nasty, threaten the police) and the electric company to install a smart reader. Neither of these happened because when I checked online I found I had the legal right to say no. Other things I have had to allow because I rent.

Your government is not threatening a deliberate infection. It does feel threatened by your boiler. It was boilers that gave rise to modern insurance companies and boiler inspections. Millions of people manage to avoid infection in far more crowded places through use of masks and disinfectant. Maybe you need to catch up on your sleep and get a grip on reality.

This is probably an important question. In my case I own my home. And my home is fairly self-sufficient. I am not hooked up to city water or the city sewer. I don't have cable TV. When I built my home there were no building codes, no city inspectors, nothing. The only utility I rely on is the electricity.

No one will ever enter my home to perform a boiler inspection because I do not have a boiler. I have a wood stove and I cut and split the wood from my property to heat my house for 6 months out of the year. And each year I climb onto my roof and perform a chimney sweep to keep the chimney free and open.

I have propane heat for my hot water and dryer. But I also perform maintenance on the ductwork the vents the dryer so that the ductwork will not become clogged by dust and lint and cause a problem.

The idea that your home is your castle is a good idea but everyone relies on others to keep their homes safe and usable. That is unless you are very self-sufficient. And I try to treat anyone who helps me with these home maintenance tasks with courtesy and respect, even in the time of the COVID pandemic.

emotrtkey, enjoy liking boots, since that is all you seem to be good at.

And with regards to what everyone else is wondering, yeah sure, it's rented, but who the hell decided that renters need to be infected? And who's anyone to try to justify it? Even if owners try to do that, I can tell them what they can go suck! But if other renters are trying to justify this to themselves? Well, you're beyond brainwashed... as if bus drivers etc. aren't dying by the tons already, oh sure, let's just make sure renters are infected...

I mean, I was never a conspiracy theorist, but the way you lot talk about this it's made to sound like the central committee of landlords are doing this to kill all the tenants, and there's no way I'm going to die without taking down at least one thug...

I'm a landlord on the UK and boiler checks here at least are an annual legal requirement. If a tenant on the other hand refuses then the blame is completely off the landlord but it risks a bad rapport between tenant and landlord and in my eyes might be a suspicious sign if you're not in an at risk group that something might be going on inside the house.

As a whole though the risk of catching the virus is very slim from a boiler check. I take it you already explained your worries to the landlord? If so and he still insists it'll probably be better to let the maintenance guy in, insist he wears a mask and bleach everything he touches after. In a way it's not really a bad sign your landlord is so insistant on checking the boiler. Many dodgy landlords might have never checked theirs in decades.