British Gas has urged households to “prepare now” for the winter ahead of most people turning on their heating by the end of this month. The energy firm said more than 1.2 million customers called on its engineers to fix broken boilers last winter to get their heating and hot water system back up and running.

The firm’s customer data shows there is a boiler switch-on each year during the first September cold snap, but the majority turn their heating on in late October or when there are four consecutive days of minimum temperatures below 9C. Sunny Solanky, a British Gas service and repair engineer, said: “Now that summer is behind us, many people will be thinking about turning their heating back on for the first time since last winter and that’s often when unwanted issues can appear.

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