Shower water temperature too cold in student accommodation. Advice?

I'm living in student halls in Newcastle, in a completely new building that was just finished this summer, and have consistently been experiencing water temperature problems.

For some reason, the water temperature has never been hot enough since I moved in in August, and it's just been getting worse as the temperature gets colder. I set the knob to as high as it will go and it is still not nearly warm enough. I'm not saying that absolutely freezing water is coming out; it's heated water, but it's not hot water. I am not trying to scald my skin off -- I would just like to take a god damn shower and not come out shivering, quite literally shivering.

I spoke to the accommodation office about it and they said "yeah, we've been hearing that from some people; we'll take a look at the whatever-whatever [some kind of individual water thermostat thing, I gathered] outside your room and see if that will help". When I got back that evening, my showerhead had been deviated to the wall, so I could only assume they messed with something then went in to test the water. I optimistically started the shower . . . no change.

The housing office had told me that the water was set to a certain temperature for Health and Safety reasons. That's well and good in theory, but it's madness because as I said, I have it set to the hottest it will go and there is no danger of burning yourself on tepid water. Furthermore, I have friends at a building on the same street and have resorted in desperation to using their shower a couple of times, and their water is fine. For God's sake, I was in a youth hostel this summer and the hot water was out of this world. I find it hard to believe that Health and Safety would mandate a water temperature this low.

I Googled extensively for answers and didn't really find advice for people who didn't have control over their own water heater. A common problem people seem to have is that their water temperature or pressure fluctuates wildly; mine doesn't. The pressure is fine, and the temperature just wavers between wait-this-is-a-bit-hotter-just-a-little-more-would-be-good and just-kidding-I-only-did-that-to-get-your-hopes-up. I was going to get a water thermometer and tell the housing office the temperature I was getting, but I couldn't find any good info online about what constitutes an acceptably-hot shower. All I found were the same old Health and Safety things concerning salmonella.

Another possibly important thing to note is that my bathroom sink (although not my kitchen sink, though both have mixer taps) can indeed get scalding.

Considering the price I'm paying, I don't believe it's asking too much to have water that is liveably hot. It's really putting a strain on my life to have to work myself up to taking a shower because I dread it so much.

What I'd like to know is if there is any sort of legal regulation that states the landlord's responsibility in this regard, and advice on anything else I can do or say to them to help fix this.

I'm living in student halls in Newcastle, in a completely new building that was just finished this summer, and have consistently been experiencing water temperature problems.

For some reason, the water temperature has never been hot enough since I moved in in August, and it's just been getting worse as the temperature gets colder. I set the knob to as high as it will go and it is still not nearly warm enough. I'm not saying that absolutely freezing water is coming out; it's heated water, but it's not hot water. I am not trying to scald my skin off -- I would just like to take a god damn shower and not come out shivering, quite literally shivering.

I spoke to the accommodation office about it and they said "yeah, we've been hearing that from some people; we'll take a look at the whatever-whatever [some kind of individual water thermostat thing, I gathered] outside your room and see if that will help". When I got back that evening, my showerhead had been deviated to the wall, so I could only assume they messed with something then went in to test the water. I optimistically started the shower . . . no change.

The housing office had told me that the water was set to a certain temperature for Health and Safety reasons. That's well and good in theory, but it's madness because as I said, I have it set to the hottest it will go and there is no danger of burning yourself on tepid water. Furthermore, I have friends at a building on the same street and have resorted in desperation to using their shower a couple of times, and their water is fine. For God's sake, I was in a youth hostel this summer and the hot water was out of this world. I find it hard to believe that Health and Safety would mandate a water temperature this low.

I Googled extensively for answers and didn't really find advice for people who didn't have control over their own water heater. A common problem people seem to have is that their water temperature or pressure fluctuates wildly; mine doesn't. The pressure is fine, and the temperature just wavers between wait-this-is-a-bit-hotter-just-a-little-more-would-be-good and just-kidding-I-only-did-that-to-get-your-hopes-up. I was going to get a water thermometer and tell the housing office the temperature I was getting, but I couldn't find any good info online about what constitutes an acceptably-hot shower. All I found were the same old Health and Safety things concerning salmonella.

Another possibly important thing to note is that my bathroom sink (although not my kitchen sink, though both have mixer taps) can indeed get scalding.

Considering the price I'm paying, I don't believe it's asking too much to have water that is liveably hot. It's really putting a strain on my life to have to work myself up to taking a shower because I dread it so much.

What I'd like to know is if there is any sort of legal regulation that states the landlord's responsibility in this regard, and advice on anything else I can do or say to them to help fix this.