For some people this ranks right up there with apartment hunting and laundry as a Geneva-specific difficulty, especially when you get a sudden cold spell as we have had this week.

Normally the heating for your building will be turned on some time in October,  It will start off at quite low heat and will increase in steps throughout the month to a level that will not be enough for the coldest part of winter.  Very little that you do with the controls in your apartment will make any difference at all.  Neither will complaining to your regie, building owner or caretaker, apparently, as they all consider it to be normal.

If you are lucky, and in a newish building, you may be an exception to this, but you should probably be ready to invest in some additional heating appliances.

What Andry describes is one possibility.

You may also simply have to turn the heating on at the thermostat rather than the radiators/heaters. It should be located in a central place on the wall. Simply increase the thermostat to 22 for a start, and see if the radiators warm up. Make sure you open them by turning the handle. Some (digital) thermostats are a bit tricky to operate, but just play around with the buttons and you should be able to figure it out.

If you can't find the thermostat, revert back to Andy's answer. 

Gents - thank you for the feedback! I wasn't expecting Switzerland to be so behind in matters such as heating and laundry (yes I noticed the laundry dilemma on my second day, geesh these machines). Edward unfortunately there is no thermostat in this apartment so will have to follow Andy's advise. 

Not just Geneva ..  

Here in canton Vaud, back in May we went around each radiator, 16 of them!!  and turned them all off.. Today the missus turned a couple back on and --- well nothing .. The building is still in summer mode. 

Far too soon for heating anyways :)

Come to France or the UK and you'll see how Geneva's flats are extremely well heated. Never had temperatures below 22 degrees from October to April during 30 years spent in this town. 

Now I'm freezing in Ferney because they have electrical heating which costs a real fortune. 

Plus don't judge the whole Switzerland by just staying in a flat in Geneva. I keep on repeating I love Geneva but it is in no way representative of Switzerland.

Thank your lucky stars that we are now in the 21 st century and the heating will be switched on when the temperature falls below a certain level which is usually decided by the Régie.

It’s not so long ago that in CH the heating was never switched on before 1 November and then switched off on 31 March whatever the outside temperature.

Be prepared too, if the coming winter is particularly long and severe, for an invoice from the Régie to cover the “extra” fuel costs.  

It’s prudent to have one or two electric heaters in the apartment, especially if you have children or elderly visitors, but using them will up your electricity bill.

Cosy indoor clothing and slippers are also a good investment, preferably purchased before the winter sets in because shops can run out of stock surprisingly quickly.

All the best,

R.

Meanwhile in Russia you can enjoy the warmth (24 Celcius) so pack your boxer shorts and T-shirt for a comfortable winter. You have almost unlimited hot water so I enjoyed long hot showers.

For some Russian humour, https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses/16692

I am looking forward to going back again end of January.

Skiing in Sochi is on my todo list.

Bravo for an intriguing update of a 9-year-old thread.

Best, R.

For the heating, another reason for radiators May not be not functioning very well,  can be  large air bubbles in the heating. system..

One winter, despite the heating being on, one of my radiators were hardly warm. Once someone had come to empty the air, the radiator was warm again.( was free service supplied by the Regie.)

I was thinking to do this myself with a key that can be bought for this reason in hardware stores, but luckily I was warned in time not to do this, as the man who came to do it,  told me that unless a specific key was used with my radiators in my apartment, I would have risked a flood, from the radiator. He also  checked my other radiators as he told me thatone malfunctioning one can affect the others.

 Regarding your post, Gerald, would you have another link, as don.‘t have telegram, or failing that, some key words or title of whatever the link is showing,  so can look it up on another platform?

Thanks in advance

Apologies for typos in above post, am on a temporary, temperamental tablet at the moment ..

Hi TogJay,

You can install for almost any platform from https://telegram.org/

Best wishes,

Gerold

Thanks Gerold for the info.

, I am not particularly interested to install telegram itself, just was asking for key words, title, or subject of the link you provided us with, so I can find the same thing on another platform  - which is almost always the case if you search a bit.

Always ready to source something funny, especially these days!