Washing machine cover

rebeccak

I bought a new washer/dryer just under a year ago which came with a year-long manufacturer's warranty. This is now about to expire and I've been sent letters offering me a further two years for £199.00.

I'm just wondering if anyone has any advice on this. I thought there might be an article on this somewhere on mse but I haven't been able to find one and am not sure whether this kind of cover is best described as a 'warranty' or 'insurance' or something else so I am not really sure what I'm searching for!

I haven't got cover for any of my other appliances (they are all very old ones - the fridge is falling apart so I'm going to get a new one, the oven is half-broken but I'm living with it - so I'm kind of resigned to replacing them at some point). I'm not confident with dealing with repairmen and don't understand the workings of these appliances and so, if possible, prefer to have cover rather than having to choose a suitable repairman and getting ripped off by some cowboy.

I do have (already expensive) British Gas cover for the boiler, electrics and plumbing so I think I could extend that to include appliances too but am just wondering if anyone has any advice???

paulofessex

£199 seems a little high. Try Googling 'Domestic & General' as if l recall correctly you can see the prices on the site.

csnann

I bought a washing machine last year, Domestic & General have written offering me 1 years extended warranty for about £65.

McKneff

or put £10 a month away in a separate account for repairs, year 1 you will hve £120, at the end of year 2 you will have £240, and on and on, more than enough to cover any repairs. Give it to D & G and dont use them, the money is theirs.

rebeccak

Thanks for the suggestions. The extended warranty I was offered is from Domestic & General (although you have to look at the small print to see that). However, when I go directly to their site and enter my details, I get offered a cheaper quote. :huh:

dander

£199 for 2 years on a washing machine sounds like a terrible deal to me. The chances of breaking down are slim enough, and the chances of the repair costs being more than £200 are even slimmer. Yes, you might be REALLY unlucky and have the whole thing go kaput within 3 years of purchase, but you're more likely to not have a single problem and just lose £200.

alanstuart

we got a washer last year from argos and they wanted about £199 for 3 years warranty,we decided to go with domestic & general and got a two year warranty for £94

alanstuart

alexlyne

Don't forget the EU Directive 1999/44/EC.

'A two-year guarantee applies for the sale of all consumer goods everywhere in the EU. In some countries, this may be more, and some manufacturers also choose to offer a longer warranty period.'

So hold off for a year. In my experience, they will write in another year anyway.

Mayflower10cat

Years ago, British Gas rang me & asked if I'd be interested in a special deal on appliance cover as we were existing customers with a service contact for the boiler. If I remember rightly, they were quoting me £8 a month for the first three months then the usual price would apply (think it was £15) It would cover up to four appliances. I said, Oh, OK then. Anyway, four months later I was looking to make some household savings and thought I'd cancel the appliance cover. Literally minutes before I rang British Gas - my washer-dryer packed up. It was just over a year old.

The repairman admittedly did have to come twice, and the second repair was much more major (literally all the electrics and the programmer) but he said - you've pretty much got a new washing machine.

I did cancel the cover a few months later as we were moving house and wouldn't have mains gas. But wasn't it lucky!

We still have the same washer-dryer more than 10 years on. And it's only an Indesit!

ormus

complete waste of money.
BG are making huge profits out of warranties.
domgen are just con merchants IMO.

JodyBPM

I did buy cover for my washer dryer at the end of the one year warranty period, but only because it had played up A LOT and needed several repairs during the first year. I know I could have chanced it and gone the SOGA route had it died, but frankly the £5 a month seemed better than having to fight with Currys! Sure enough, about three months in the whole thing went caput, turned out to be a faulty control panel. So worth it for me in that instance. We're still paying insurance a couple of years later (now £7.50/m), but since it hasn't gone wrong since the control panel was replaced, I'm seriously considering cancelling it when it comes up for renewal.

In general, though, if you have no reason to believe that the appliance is likely to fail in the near future, I'd say they're rather a rip off. I don't have them for any of my other appliances, and wouldn't, but that washer drier was so unreliable that it was a pretty good bet that it was going to fail!

As someone else already said, you are better off putting say £10 per appliance a month into a "replacement/repair" fund, and make sure that you have money to repair or replace as necessary.