Removal and replacement
The old cylinder out without damaging the ceiling, and the new one positioned so it can be serviced later.
Home / Geyser Installation
Geyser installation in Durban is not finished when the water is hot. It is finished when the Certificate of Compliance is in your hand, with a registration number on it you can check yourself. If the old one might be repairable, we will say so first.
Tell us the size if you know it and where the geyser sits. A ceiling installation, an outside wall and a roof mounted solar system are three different jobs and three different prices.
Everything below is part of the job rather than an optional extra, and the last item is the one people have to chase.
The old cylinder out without damaging the ceiling, and the new one positioned so it can be serviced later.
Temperature and pressure valve, pressure control valve and both vacuum breakers, sized and fitted to standard.
Discharging to a visible point outside, so a future failure announces itself on the paving rather than in the ceiling.
Supported properly and lagged on the hot side, which is where the running cost saving quietly lives.
Priced alongside a like for like replacement, because the pipework is already open and this is the cheap moment.
Issued on completion with a registration number you can verify, not promised and then chased for a month.
Almost everyone treats a Certificate of Compliance as a formality: a page that appears at the end of the job, gets filed, and is never thought about again. Then a cylinder empties itself through a bedroom ceiling, and the filed page turns out to be the first thing an assessor asks for. Whether the claim settles can come down to it.
Here is the part that is not widely understood. The certificate carries no authority of its own. It is only valid because a registered person issued it, which means its entire worth rests on that plumber's registration with the Plumbing Industry Registration Board being current on the day it was signed. Not held once. Not applied for. Current, on the date on the document. A certificate issued by somebody whose registration had lapsed is worth nothing at all, and it looks completely identical to one that is worth everything.
There is a second and more ordinary failure that shows up repeatedly in this market, which is the certificate that is promised and simply never arrives. The pattern is always the same: the work is done, the customer pays on completion because the job looks finished, and then the document that was going to support an insurance claim turns into a month of unanswered messages. The money has already moved, so there is nothing left to hold back, and the claim sits unresolved.
Both problems have the same answer and it takes about two minutes. Ask for the registration number before the work starts. Go to pirb.co.za, use the verification search, confirm the name matches and the registration is current. Then agree, out loud and preferably in writing, that the certificate is handed over on completion. Keep the final payment until it is in your hand.
We would genuinely rather you checked our number than believed us about it. That advice costs us the benefit of the doubt on every first enquiry, and it is worth giving anyway, because the only real protection you have on this purchase is a verification you can run yourself in a browser before anybody is paid.
Five checks, in order. The first two happen before the work starts.
Four separate lines, so you can see what you are buying and compare it honestly.
If the cylinder is sound, you get told that, even though the replacement is the bigger sale of the two.
Separate lines for the unit, the labour and the valve work, rather than one number that hides all three.
Issuing it is part of doing the work compliantly. It is not a line item and it is not an upgrade.
Solar and heat pump figures alongside the like for like, because now is when the change is cheap.
Cost first, then the certificate, which is the part that decides whether a claim pays.
The cylinder is the smaller part of it more often than people expect. The price is made up of the geyser itself, the labour to get the old one out and the new one in, any pipework and valves that have to be brought up to standard while it is open, and the certificate. Labour follows the trade's published national guidance of R450 to R850 an hour excluding VAT. Ask for those as separate lines rather than one figure, because a single number makes it impossible to tell what you are buying. Our prices page explains how a bill like this is built.
It is the document that says the installation meets the standard, and its real value arrives later, on the day something goes wrong. When a geyser damages a ceiling and you claim, the insurer will want to know the installation was compliant. It is also required on property transfer. The important detail is that the certificate is only valid if the plumber's registration with the Plumbing Industry Registration Board was current on the day it was issued. A certificate from someone whose registration had lapsed is a piece of paper and nothing more.
Ask for the registration number, then go to pirb.co.za and use the verification search, which takes a name or a number. Confirm the name that comes back matches the person who did your work, and confirm the registration is current rather than expired. Do this before you pay the final amount, because that is the only moment you have any leverage. We would rather you checked ours than took our word for it, and that advice is against our own interest, which is exactly why it is worth giving.
This is the most common serious complaint in this market and it is worth knowing the sequence. Ask in writing, once, with the date of the work and the amount paid. If nothing comes, take it to PIRB directly, because the board registers the plumber and has an interest in certificates being issued by the people it registers. Failing that, a new compliant installation can be certified fresh by whoever does it. The lesson for next time is simple: agree that the certificate is handed over on completion, and hold the final payment until it is.
No, and a replacement is the one moment when changing the arrangement costs little extra because the pipework is open anyway. It is worth considering a different size if the household has changed, moving a geyser out of a ceiling void to a position where a future failure drains somewhere harmless, or converting to solar or a heat pump. Those are all far cheaper done now than as a separate job later. What should not change without a reason is the safety arrangement, which exists to a standard.
Both genuinely reduce running cost and both have a real answer to the question of what happens on a grey Durban week, but they are different purchases. Solar stores heat and needs sun, so it carries an electrical backup element for the days it does not get any. A heat pump moves heat rather than making it and works regardless of sunshine, but it is a machine with a fan and a compressor, so it has moving parts that eventually need servicing. The honest summary is that the savings are real and the payback period is long enough that it should be a considered decision, not a doorstep one.
Four things have to be right for an installation to comply: a safety valve with somewhere real to discharge to, vacuum breakers fitted on hot and cold, a drip tray whose overflow ends somewhere you will actually see it, and pipework that is carried properly and lagged. On older Durban installations the item most often missing or blocked is a drip tray overflow that goes nowhere, which means the first sign of a leak is a ceiling rather than water appearing outside. It is a small thing to fix while everything is open and an expensive thing to discover later.
Because it is the geyser's only way of telling you something is wrong before it becomes a ceiling. A drip tray that discharges to a visible point outside turns a slow failure into a puddle you notice on the paving. A tray that discharges into a roof void, or into a pipe that has been capped or has come adrift, turns exactly the same slow failure into months of soaking timber and a collapse that arrives without warning. The installation standard is asking for a warning system, and it is worth having.
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Replacing a geyser in Durban? Tell us the size and where it sits, and you get the cylinder, the labour and the valve work as separate figures.