Unearthed Teka appliances - Check your plug!

whitegoods_engineer

Last week, I attended a new, in-guarantee Teka washing machine for a knocking fault and was amazed to find that it had been supplied to the end user with a continental 2 pin plug, with no effective earth pin!

I spoke with the supplier who defended supplying the appliance by saying that they usually installed the appliances themselves, and they always changed the plug to a UK one.

They said that the customer wanted to install it themselves, and that they supplied it on the basis that the customer knew what to do.

I said to him that he should not be selling these as they were clearly not to UK specifications and regulations. He was adamant that he was not doing anything wrong.

I replaced the plug on the appliance and left it electrically safe.

However, the very next call I went to was another Teka installed by a well known kitchen company, and this one had had the plug changed over correctly by the kitchen company. So it appears that these are presumably being imported from somewhere with the continental plugs being swapped over before delivery to the customer.

However, as in the first case, They are obviously ending up at end users with the incorrect and potentially dangerous unearthed plugs.

So I would advise anybody who has a Teka appliance to check that the plug is a standard 3 pin UK plug, and if it is connected on only the live and neutral pin to disconnect it immediately.

Surely these machines should not be coming into the UK with continental plugs on

shaun_from_Africa

I would suggest that you make a written report to both the Health and safety executive and Trading standards, as it's obvious that the person who supplied the appliance either doesn't know the law, or they know it and chose to ignore it. (You obviously know the requirements, but I'm just pasting a snippet of them below for others to read)
It is actually the importer who should ensure the correct plug is fitted, and if it isn't, they are commiting an offence.

The Plugs and Sockets etc (Safety) Regulations 1994

Part 2 – Fitted plug provisions. What are the requirements?

1. From 1 February 1995 manufactures and importers (known as "first suppliers") who supply domestic electrical appliances listed below must ensure the appliance is correctly fitted with:
2. an appropriately fused and approved standard plug or
3. an approved conversion plug where the appliance has a non-UK plug complying with IEC 884.1:1987 (Europlug).

Responsibility for fitting this standard plug or conversion plug will be with the first supplier of the appliance in the UK.

papalaz

I work on the helpdesk for a different manufacturer, only had this occur a couple of times in 7yrs but we immeadiately uplift/exchange without question. One even had an unrecognisable model number that wasn't for sale in this country, mystery how it got here but im surprised it doesnt happen more often as we are in the EU.

molerat

How was the appliance not earthed ? How was it connected to the uk mains ? Schuko type plugs do have an earth.

shaun_from_Africa

Schuko plugs do have an earthing facility (it is a socket and not a protruding pin as on UK plugs), and for the appliance to correctly earthed, it must be connected up to a mains socket that has an earthing pin.
You can get adaptors, but not all of these have the earthing facility as they are generally designed for low power uses where earthing isn't always a safety issue.

Even if the correct adaptor was used, it is still illegal to sell the washing machine in the UK without the correct plug fitted, and another point to remember is that the plug wouldn't have been correctly fused.
The whole purpose of the longer earth pin on UK plugs is so that this pin is connected up before either the live or neutral are connected, again a safety issue with the plug that was fitted.

whitegoods_engineer

Thanks for all the replies.

The appliance in question had had the 2 pins forced into one of those ordinary 3-outlet adaptor cubes as just about everybody will have somewhere in their house, and this in turn had been plugged into the wall outlet. There was an earth terminal on the plug which as was correctly stated earlier by a previous poster, a metal hole in the plug which would accept an earthing pin, but of course there was nothing for it to connect to.

I wouldn't mind guessing that there will be hundreds of these similarly plugged in in this manner, and that is a scary thought. I am a bit worried about this and am considering bringing this to the attention of trading standards.

I can give full details of the customer and supplier as the customer was complaining over the phone to the supplier during my visit, and she handed me the phone to talk to him, as she really didn't understand what was wrong as of course, it operated without the earth!