Fire risks prompt tumble dryer recall - Now washing machines as well!

[haaammit]

Well the repair on my old TCR2 was finished today. The back, the bearing and the drum were replaced, just as the engineer said they would be. We have a new crinkly drum! He jokingly said the old drums make good planters for the garden and he's got quite a few already lol.

200,000 repairs done so far and the recall has generated ~5,000,000 calls according to the engineer!! Holy hell. He was also saying some people have been setting light to their dryers to claim compo and people are buying old machines just to get the upgrade/repair done. Unbelievable.

Yeah they seem to really not give a rats ass.

Then why are some people getting it done immediately as soon as they start piping up on things like facebook or twitter?

They've got one or two to get through dude

 

[jpod]

How do you know if it is time to use a tumble drier?

Look in your pants, if there is a willy it is not time

 

[Bluecube]

Called up about a seven year old Indesit I had. Two weeks later I had a brand spanking new Hotpoint. Great stuff!

 

[Dis86]

They've got one or two to get through dude

It's really not that hard to send a blanket email every now and then is it?

We've had nothing in nearly four months other than acknowledgements that emails have been received.

I don't think that's acceptable, do you?

Going by the numbers here if they've had five million reports and only fixed 200k in four months say it's going to take them nearly ten years to fix them all!
Again, not acceptable.

 

[haaammit]

It's really not that hard to send a blanket email every now and then is it?

We've had nothing in nearly four months other than acknowledgements that emails have been received.

I don't think that's acceptable, do you?

Going by the numbers here if they've had five million reports and only fixed 200k in four months say it's going to take them nearly ten years to fix them all!
Again, not acceptable.

It's a massive and unprecedented problem, so yes, there will be some problems.
I gave (you) the phone number to ring and what to do if you registered your machine right at the beginning and had heard nothing after 8 weeks. Have you tried that?

Edit Oh wait, never mind - you never did say what email you chased them up on. After lots of searching I couldn't find an email to "chase them up" with, so would still like to know what email you used (hence why I phoned them on the number I supplied earlier in the thread).

 

[Danthus]

How many have caught fire?

 

[Dis86]

It's a massive and unprecedented problem, so yes, there will be some problems.
I gave (you) the phone number to ring and what to do if you registered your machine right at the beginning and had heard nothing after 8 weeks. Have you tried that?

Edit Oh wait, never mind - you never did say what email you chased them up on. After lots of searching I couldn't find an email to "chase them up" with, so would still like to know what email you used.

Girlfriend sorted it but I think it was directly to their ceo. Mauritzo or something like that. She's giving it zeds now so I'll check tomorrow.
The only responses I've seen people get were people who kicked up a stink on facebook or twitter.

 

[Dis86]

How many have caught fire?

Between 2011 and 2014 350 according to which?
The article was written in 2015. At which point they were still trying to deny there was a problem...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/sho...r-ignored-safety-warnings-over-fire-risk.html

Seems they've been getting told for quite some time there was a problem, years infact.
So the problem maybe isn't unprecedented?

 

[Danthus]

Part of the problem is, the owners don't clean the filters, that isn't good PR though.

Forget the manufacturer, any appliance that has fluff in it and a two kilowatt heater is going to be a risk.

How many people here are worried about their fridge freezer?

 

[james.miller]

Part of the problem, yes. The design of the filter, at least on the idc75, meant the fluff got past it regardless. I cleaned mine every load and cleaned the condenser every month and still there was a lot of fluff in that condenser and if it was in there then it was further up the chain as well. The 'fix' as far as we are led to believe is installing a shroud around the heater, because they know no matter how much you clean them fluff will get in there. poor preventative maintenance is not solely to blame, part of the reason this is such a massive job.

 

[Dis86]

Part of the problem is, the owners don't clean the filters, that isn't good PR though.

Forget the manufacturer, any appliance that has fluff in it and a two kilowatt heater is going to be a risk.

How many people here are worried about their fridge freezer?

Oh without a doubt. The trouble is when selling products to people who are potentially idiots you really have to to try to make them idiot proof!
What you don't do is flat out deny there's a problem for years when an independent third party tells you there may be one...you investigate and tell people to take precautions!

 

[Danthus]

Part of the problem, yes. The design of the filter, at least on the idc75, meant the fluff got past it regardless. I cleaned mine every load and cleaned the condenser every month and still there was a lot of fluff in that condenser and if it was in there then it was further up the chain as well. The 'fix' as far as we are led to believe is installing a shroud around the heater, because they know no matter how much you clean them fluff will get in there. poor preventative maintenance is not solely to blame, part of the reason this is such a massive job.

The filter isn't the problem, if it was, it would be part of the modification.

 

[ThundyCat]

Had an email to say our repair will not be done until August!

 

[james.miller]

The filter isn't the problem, if it was, it would be part of the modification.

Not sure what point you are trying to make. on the idc75 at least the filter design IS a weak point and fluff does get past it. I dont know if they can fix that by changing the filter panel alone - perhaps they are only looking at the immediate concern which is fluff building up on the heater element.

 

[Danthus]

The point I am making is the filter is not the problem, if it was they would be changing it, I know this as I am doing some of the work.

I had a pallet load of the modification kits delivered last week.

 

[james.miller]

You know what they've instructed you to change. the design is flawed otherwise the replacement machine wouldnt use a two sided filter that collects fluff in the middle. You can't argue that.

Anyway, silly argument. Wether the filter is flawed or not, the shroud is obviously more important.

 

[IrishChr1s]

Checked my serial number a few weeks ago after seeing this thread, I have one of the models affected

Checked the condenser filter and it was seriously clogged up, even found an old work ID half melted in amongst the fluff

We cleaned the fluff filter and emptied the water after every run, the fluff however in the condenser filter seemed like it had been there since we bought it 12 months ago

Thanks to this thread I may have avoided a fire in my apartment

 

[chaparral]

Had an email to say our repair will not be done until August!

If it was me i would just buy a new dryer...

It just Not worth taking the chance of a fire that could cause god knows how many thousands of pounds worth of damage plus all the following months hassle a fire could cause me over something that would only cost a few hundred pounds to replace to be safe..

 

[james.miller]

ThundyCat is the £99 replacement an option?

 

[Martini1991]

We've only had our tumble dryer for 2 years, and about 4 months of that it's been unused because of this fault.

Now the ETA is July. What the crap.