The phone rang one Saturday morning in our Estepona Showroom "can you look at my Hot Tub Jacuzzi Style Spa please it doesn't work".

We go through the usual pleasantries - how long as he had the Spa ? about two years - what make is it - does it have good controls that I recognize like for example Balboa and it does so Im confident we can get parts and then the potential client tells me that he wasn't very happy with the original sale and installation in the first place. On no account would he go back to the original supplier if he could find him which he cannot. It's a Hot Tub Jacuzzi from a Major American maker but it is a little bit dated in my view from the design point of view but a perfectly good product never the less and more than adequate for the its intended purpose certainly not a cheap import.

On the telephone we can get a good idea of what might be the problem and it would appear that at this stage the Spa has no power and my initial reaction is that it is possibly a mains electrical fault of some kind. The Juice is not getting through for what ever reason

So with my pal Ulf (a Swede) we go for a drive in to the country to see the Hot Tub.

When we arrive the first thing I notice is that completely against the maker's instruction and best practice there is no breaker switch accessible to turn off the suppy of electricity.

There is a breaker but it has been fitted INSIDE the spa and is then behind a locked door requiring a key. So if there was a requirement to switch off the spa in a hurry or for what ever reason the breaker just not where it should be.

We move on some simple checks and surprise the spa is not earthed? The house does not seem to be earthed!!! Well this is Spain. But this House has been rewired on the last two / three years BUT NO EARTH!!!

We turn every thing off and open the breaker. The blue wires are the wrong size to carry the load they are to small and the colour has changed from blue to black as they were getting close to ignition. The ceramic part of the broker has started to go brown as it was close to ignition. It smelt like an incendiary device and it had clearly been getting very hot and far too close to ignition. The Breaker that had been supplied was of the wrong size as was the cables.

The spa company had just dropped off the spa and said here is your spa and we have a local electrician coming tomorrow to wire it up. He probably did a good job but was not briefed or trained on the project. It is as if the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing.

We got an independent electrician in to Earth the Spa and rewired the Spa as required with proper sized cables.

The Moral of the Story when it comes to Hot Tubs deal with the professionals