BOB FIXES STROKE VICTIM'S CENTRAL HEATING BOILER AHEAD OF WINTER FREEZE

Band of Builders (BoB) has come to the rescue of a Gloucestershire man – who has a brain injury after suffering a stroke a decade ago, which left him unable to work – by fixing his central heating boiler so that he can be warm in his home this winter.

Michael Dangerfield – known to everyone as Willie – recently moved into a new flat following a divorce but couldn’t afford the eye-watering cost of repairing his boiler.

The former general builder’s key worker Sharon Schmitz at Headway Gloucestershire – a charity dedicated to improving life after brain injury – found BoB online and helped him with the application for the boiler repair, which has been broken for the last six months.

BoB stepped in to help Willie, who suffers from fatigue and memory loss as a result of the stroke and faces a long road to recovery.

Heating engineer Matt O’Brien from Cradley made two trips to Willie’s home after it emerged that the original quote to repair the boiler had misdiagnosed the fault – meaning Matt couldn’t fix the boiler on the first visit and had to return after ordering the right parts.

Speaking from his now cosy, warm home, Willie is full of praise for BoB.

“It’s brilliant,” he said. “The boiler has been broken since I moved in and I got a quote locally to fix it – but I had no way of finding that amount of money to pay for it.

“Sharon found Band of Builders online and helped me with the application. Matt was brilliant in fixing the boiler so my flat is all warm and cosy now, thanks to an amazing charity.”

Matt – a veteran of a number of the charity’s 35 projects to date – was happy to take time out from his very busy schedule to help Willie.

He said: “It’s important that the construction industry looks after its own because, as with the case of Willie, our lives could change dramatically in a heartbeat.

“Band of Builders is a community of tradespeople who like to give something back, and in Willie’s case a couple of hours of my time repairing his boiler means that Willie will have a warm home this winter.”