Guest post – and the author is my husband :-):

When we moved to Portugal and bought a detached house, one of the tasks involved in the modernisation work was to install a central heating system. At that time – just as had been the case in Germany – oil-fired central heating systems were frowned upon as major polluters; meanwhile, even gas heating systems, which had been hailed as the ultimate alternative, had been declared by the Ministry for the Environment to be of little economic benefit (to whomever that might be), and the trend was shifting towards heat pumps, which were supposed to see households through the cold season. Consequently, this trend was also promoted in Portugal; however, from our own experience, we found that the systems available on the market usually gave up the ghost once the warranty period had expired – quite apart from the fact that their relatively high electricity consumption was never highlighted as a factor.

So the choice came down to oil, wood or pellet heating. To benefit from the ease of maintenance offered by an oil-fired heating system – something I was familiar with from my detached house in Germany – my search turned to Buderus, particularly as this brand had performed virtually flawlessly as an oil-fired heating system since 1974, if one disregards the replacement of the rocket burner after 25 years of trouble-free operation, an investment of around €1,500.

Given the circumstances, I then opted for an Edilkamin pellet boiler – specifically the Gora2 Slim up model, an 18 kW boiler that was touted as a state-of-the-art unit. In the summer of 2023, the system was installed, comprising 12 radiators, a 300-litre hot water tank and the pumps, expansion tanks and other components required for its operation. The quote also included a solar thermal circuit and an electric heater in the water tank, which was intended to ensure a supply of domestic hot water. In September 2023, the installation work was completed, the system was commissioned, and thus began a three-year odyssey of malfunctions, breakdowns and attempts to claim under my warranty.

Right from the first few days after commissioning, faults such as ‘burner tray dirty’ or ‘flue blocked’ began to occur frequently; the combustion chamber looked more like a tarmac road than a combustion chamber. Even the seller’s own technicians were soon at their wits’ end, so the seller requested a technician from the sole distributor for Portugal. He took four months to arrive – for health reasons – but when he finally did, he brought a spare part with him: the shaft that operates the boiler’s automatic cleaning system. This was fitted, the software was updated, and the boiler was then put back into operation. Looking back now, I can say that, in the boiler I purchased, it is precisely this automatic cleaning system that is the main problem, and all the faults that have occurred to date stem from the technical design of this cleaning system. Be that as it may, the next fault was not long in coming; after about two days, the now-familiar error messages reappeared and the boiler shut down once again. Once again, the seller’s technicians came round; their solution was to dismantle the boiler and carry out cleaning work that was actually intended for the annual service. The boiler was then put back into operation and lasted for a few days; at best, the system ran without fault for a week. Three months after installation, I noticed severe signs of rust on the combustion chamber, which had progressed to such an extent that the combustion chamber could no longer be removed for cleaning purposes as intended, because it had become jammed and now also showed clear cracks. The complaint brought the seller’s technicians back on the scene, who were forced to break the burner pot whilst attempting to resolve the issue. It took three months to source a replacement burner pot, so the boiler remained out of service for the remainder of the heating season.

In the following year, 2024, the malfunctions and breakdowns continued even after the installation of the new, technically improved combustion chamber. Even switching to a different pellet supplier brought little improvement, so I urged the seller to replace the boiler on warranty grounds, but he repeatedly evaded the issue in a manner that appears to be common practice in Portugal. I kept records of the interventions I carried out; at times, I had to make adjustments to the boiler up to five times a day just to get it running again. Faced with the seller’s unwillingness to honour my warranty claims, and based on my significantly more positive experiences with an oil-fired central heating system from Germany, I then set out once again to find Buderus or Viessmann systems in Portugal.

In Portugal, following the takeover by Bosch, Buderus was no longer sold here. The only German brand on the national market is Viessmann, although on its website the heating oil section is only revealed after a fair bit of clicking around. There is an exclusive distributor in Lisbon who does stock the brand and its accessories, but does not carry out any installation or maintenance work. At least, during a visit there, I managed to get two addresses in my region from whom, in addition to sales, installation and maintenance are also offered. I emailed both companies and asked for technical advice. Now, in Portugal, communication tends to take place via social media, and neither company even sent a confirmation that my enquiry had been received. So I had to pay them a personal visit. At both companies, my email was eventually found after a search through their inboxes (oh, the wonders of IT). In a subsequent discussion with the management, they briefly noted down what I was looking for; after I had sent them photos of the existing system, I was promised a quotation for the requested modifications. This was a long time coming; it was only after my third reminder that the quotation arrived, which – despite the existing installations – came to around €13,000. I did find it remarkable that the price for the boiler alone – at an estimated €5,800 – was higher than that quoted by the sole distributor for Portugal, based in Lisbon; although I must point out that, during my visit to Lisbon, I was told that end customers could not be given any discounts on the quoted price, whilst recommended installation companies would receive a discount from the sole distributor. Prices from a wide variety of online suppliers also ranged between €4,800 and €5,400. Similarly, the German-made heating oil tank included in the quote was offered at a price twice as high as the online quotes. In response to my objections, the reply was short and to the point: “This is our best offer; we cannot offer any reduction on these already tightly calculated prices.” I see! Well, never mind then.

During my visit, the second company had promised to send a technician to inspect the existing installation, but this only happened after I’d sent a third polite reminder. This visit struck me as a bit like Napoleon. He came, he saw, he weighed … The supply pipes for the radiators were too small, the insulation wasn’t ideal, and later the chap admitted that the company had no experience with oil-fired central heating systems and that, besides, it was much more stylish to work with heat pumps and air-conditioning systems.

His suggestion was then to run the existing systems using heat pumps and to fit the three bedrooms with air-conditioning units as well – the heat exchangers for which he, in all seriousness, wanted to install on the terraces facing the street, a terrace just 1.5 metres wide! Despite my objections, I was promised a quote for the recommended system … which I’m still waiting for today. My impression from this experience is that they tend to offer only the latest trendy technology, and that even such a sales-oriented approach is apparently not strictly necessary.

So I continued to pursue my warranty claims. In September 2025, I once again had the scheduled annual maintenance carried out by the seller’s technicians. At that time, the crucible – which had already been replaced previously – was once again showing cracks and severe signs of rust, which in turn led to the boiler breaking down and coming to a standstill. The technician promised to pass the problem on to his administration to arrange for a replacement crucible to be supplied once more. During the maintenance carried out at the same time on the Nobis A10 Round pellet stove installed in the living room, it was no longer possible to establish a connection between the stove and the wireless thermometer once the maintenance was complete. As a temporary solution, the thermometer was connected to the stove via a cable, and the technician also intended to report this fault to his management; he suspected that the stove’s main circuit board – which also houses the circuitry for connecting the thermometer – would need to be replaced. I have been waiting for further information from the seller regarding this matter ever since.

In order to assess my legal position, I had in the meantime instructed a solicitor, for a ‘start-up fee’ of €100, to examine the facts of the case. Here, too, it took three reminders to obtain the information I required. To summarise the outcome: I should continue to try to reach an agreement with the seller; otherwise, I could take my case to court, although this would involve considerable costs and – in the lawyer’s opinion – little prospect of success. The next step was then to approach a body comparable to an ombudsman in Germany, i.e. an out-of-court dispute resolution body. The appointment was scheduled for 23 October 2026. Curiously, on 17 September 2026, a representative from Edilkamin Iberica – the company’s representative for Portugal and Spain – turned up unannounced to inspect the installed system. His comments clearly pointed in the direction I had suspected. Firstly, he confirmed that the model’s cleaning system was technically rather underdeveloped, which he said was to blame for the excessively frequent malfunctions and shutdowns of the boiler. Furthermore, he assessed the current condition of the boiler – now three years old – as being beyond repair and offered to replace it with a more technically advanced model from the same manufacturer, namely an Edilkamin Laguna2 P18. Although this sounded like an acceptable solution to me, it had only been promised verbally. It was only after I enquired further that I was informed that the representative’s report had been sent to the manufacturer in Italy and was now being examined there to determine why malfunctions and breakdowns on the scale described could have occurred.

The seller attended the out-of-court mediation hearing accompanied by his solicitor, repeatedly attempting in his statement to point to faults on the part of the operator (inadequate maintenance, etc.); his solicitor had apparently not done her homework, or tried to play down the matter with objections such as ‘… but the system was working’ to play down the issue. Ultimately, to my surprise, the seller’s side made an offer to dismantle and dispose of the boiler, coupled with a refund of €3,000. Not quite the €5,000 or so that the boiler had cost me, but along the lines of ‘…a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush’. Especially as I was unable to produce any verifiable quotes for the Edilkamin Iberca, I therefore decided to accept the offer made by the seller. The conciliation officer recorded the agreement in writing, and the seller was granted a 14-day period to dismantle the Gora2 Slim Up and make the refund payment.

As I was leaving the mediation centre, I mentioned to the sales assistant the issue with the wireless connection between the pellet stove and the thermometer in the living room cutting out. Apparently, he wasn’t aware of this, but promised to sort it out in the shop.

So, at the moment, I’ve been getting by since September 2025 with a partially functioning pellet stove in the living room; domestic hot water has been provided by solar thermal and electric heating ever since, and I can only heat the rooms fitted with radiators by leaving the doors to the living room open. All in all, it’s not a very satisfactory situation, especially as the dismantling and refund are still pending, there’s no certainty regarding the promises made by Edilkamin Iberica, and I’m once again faced with the decision of which heating system to choose. The most cost-effective solution would be a wood-fired central heating system, which would probably require manual stoking, and I have no experience of its ease of maintenance or reliability. The next most cost-effective solution is based on pellets; I’ve been ‘burned’ by this in the past, and then there’s the alternative of oil-fired central heating – which, in my experience, is the best solution, but very difficult to implement in Portugal. The outlook for the longer term depends on the political whims of the environment ministries, which have an impact across the whole of Europe; in my opinion, it is rather uncertain, because decisions tend to be made against operators rather than in their favour, and the ultimate aim is clearly simply to plunge consumers into utter confusion.