Five-fold fines for not allowing gas workers into the apartment angered the Russians

As soon as it became known that the government gave a positive assessment to the bill on a five-fold increase in fines for not allowing gas equipment inspectors into the apartment, a flurry of criticism immediately fell upon the authors of the legislative initiative. There are many claims to the new law not only among ordinary people who are afraid that due to the imperfection of the mechanism for its application they will be subjected to exorbitant fines. Gas industry experts are also opposed to the proposed measures to address the problem. According to the statistics of the Guild of Gas Equipment Engineers, only in 1.5% of household gas explosions, the accident was caused by situations where the owners of the apartment deliberately did not let gas workers into their homes.

The news touched the nerves of many people, and most of them believe that the state, instead of taking seriously the problem of more frequent household gas explosions in apartment buildings, is trying to shift the responsibility onto the residents themselves. Even those who support the new law in principle are asking a reasonable question, how will it be implemented: according to the mind or, as always, through the fifth point? And will it then be of any use at all, or is it just a new way to replenish the empty treasury?

“It is useless to frighten people who are already not too poor with new fines,” social media users write in the comments to the news.

“Let them come after 18.00 or on weekends, otherwise the gas workers come when people are at work. I have never seen an announcement at the entrance with the date of such a check,” others add to the topic.

“And where are the fines for scammers who pretend to be false utilities? How do we know that these are not scammers, but gas workers? Now make the left crusts just spit. And the old people, even more so, will not be able to distinguish the imaginary inspectors from the real ones.

According to Senator Andrey Kutepov, one of the authors of the sensational bill, it is proposed to amend the article of the Code of Administrative Offenses (CAO), which provides for liability for not allowing specialists to check gas equipment, as well as maintenance of smoke and ventilation ducts.

The goal of the authors of the law is to increase the level of safety when using gas equipment in residential buildings and for this purpose to raise five times the fines for not allowing gas service employees and specialists in the maintenance of smoke and ventilation ducts into the apartment. If now the size of the fine is from 1 to 2 thousand rubles, then in the future it will increase to 5-10 thousand. For officials, the maximum sanction will increase to 100 thousand rubles, for legal entities – up to 500 thousand.

“Perhaps this measure will partially help prevent accidents in residential buildings, but fines alone are clearly not enough,” said Marianna Nosova, chairman of the Moscow Region HOA. – First of all, the government should oblige management companies or gas services to install equipment in homes that will automatically detect gas leaks. At whose expense this will happen, I do not know. You may need government subsidies. And the authorities should also help our pensioners and low-income families with the replacement of old gas equipment, primarily stoves. Without these measures, no fines will help.”

Another head of the partnership suggested a practical thing: before conducting such checks, the Criminal Code should post on the entrances full information about who, what organization and when will make such rounds. The phone number of the gas company must be indicated there, where one could call and find out whether such and such an employee works for them or not.

“The first thing that comes to mind after information about such checks is that scammers are immediately activated. They are already trying by any means to get into our pocket, and now there will be no end to it. They will threaten the elderly that if they are not allowed into the apartment, they will be fined. It seems to me that in order to discourage them from such actions, it is necessary to oblige employees of the gas service, in addition to their service certificate, to carry a power of attorney that this particular person has the right to act on behalf of this organization. And you can also use social services that take care of lonely old people so that they inform them who they can open the door to, ”says Marianna.

“I wouldn’t worry too much about scammers. Yes, they are, they will always try to cash in on our gullibility, but the new law will add nothing to this topic. The rule has been working for a long time, according to which a certain service organization for servicing gas equipment is assigned to each house. The principle is this: one house – one gasman. So it is enough for tenants to call their management company or HOA to find out who is specifically assigned to the house, ”explains gas equipment engineer Leonid Vladimirov.

However, according to him, such checks do not always bring the desired effect. Often, gas workers inspect pipes and equipment superficially, for show, and then an emergency occurs. Fortunately, there were no such cases in the Moscow region, but they did occur in other regions.

“The specialist must not only visually inspect the gas equipment and gas pipeline, all connections, fixtures, taps, and so on, but also check their serviceability and compliance with regulatory requirements. Be sure to check if the connections are tight when the devices are turned off. The inspector is obliged to adjust the gas equipment, make sure that the gas pressure in front of the stove with the burners working and not working is normal. In general, this is a large amount of work, if done in good faith, ”says the expert.

According to him, the percentage of cases when apartment owners deliberately do not allow gas service employees to visit them is negligible. Basically, these are people who have made redevelopment of their apartment without any coordination and at the same time closed the ventilation ducts, transferred other communications. All other problems of preventing gas workers from entering apartments can be explained by a banal reason: inspectors come when people are not at home. Either they are at work, or on vacation, on a business trip.

“I don’t believe that tougher fines will solve the problem with the safe operation of gas equipment in apartment buildings. Although it is easier to do this: you just need to oblige all homeowners to install gas analyzers with automatic gas shutoff in their apartments and replace old stoves that have served their purpose. Pensioners and the poor will have to be helped, but with everyone else you can not be silly: there is no control device, we turn off the gas and that’s it. Such a device costs 5-7 thousand, but it will save the life and property of the owner and his neighbors, ”says Vladimirov.