Sleeping in the newly acquired house for the first time was of course a great thing! Even though we had only set up camping furniture and cardboard boxes so far so that we didn’t have to move any nice furniture around the house during the renovation.

So we unpack our suitcases, the first beer is opened and a glance at the digital heating controller tells us: the previous owner kept his word and switched on the (underfloor!) heating for us. That made perfect sense back in January. But because it was quite cold outside, the temperatures in the house were still well below the comfort zone. They were around 14 degrees.

Four hours and a few beers later: 14 degrees. Hmm… Well… Okay, underfloor heating is sluggish. But no improvement at all?

After another two hours – it was now Thursday afternoon – we sent a message to our architect asking if he could recommend a heating company. The answer came at around 5 p.m. and the architect also called them directly for us and made an appointment for “tomorrow morning”. That was nice, because the friendly heating engineer – Michele – spoke practically no English and we spoke no Italian.

“Tomorrow morning” at 8 o’clock on the dot, there was a strange car in our small parking lot. It’s crazy that it made it up here safely on such a narrow, steep road. The friendly heating engineer took a few glances into the boiler room and the controls, mumbled something to himself in Italian and then told us that the pipes urgently needed to be cleaned and all sorts of adjustments made. Unfortunately, his employees wouldn’t be able to do this before tomorrow (Saturday!!). But “tomorrow morning” he would come back with his staff and his English-speaking 16-year-old daughter.

“Tomorrow morning”, again at 8 a.m., an enduro with Michele and her daughter rattled onto our property, followed by a car with two fitters. Big hello, big hustle and bustle and at 12 noon everyone packed up. Uh, hello? Are they having lunch now? No! Everything is ready, the heating is running, the temperature is visibly rising. “Only the controls need to be replaced so that you don’t have any problems later. That’s being done by another company. Unfortunately, they can’t come until Monday morning.

“Monday morning”, a young man arrives punctually at eight, explains to me in fluent English that the control system is outdated, installs a new one that can be controlled via app, helps me log in and synchronize, and leaves again after two hours.

Let me summarize again. Contacted the heating company at 5pm on Thursday, everything ready by Monday lunchtime. That’s the best I can do!

So here is a heartfelt recommendation:

Idraulica Negri S.R.L.

Michele Giovanni Negri

Via Cavalcavia Boesio 9

21014 Laveno-Mombello

Tel. 033-2666571

Mail: idranegri@gmail.com