Worth repairing Miele washer/dryer?

abd08

Hi folks,

We moved into our house and were lucky enough to find a Miele washer/dryer (WT2679i). It had apparently been purchased around October 2009. Similar machine today is about £1700 odd.

Recently it seems to have developed an electrical fault, where when we turn it on it trips the RCD.

Speaking to Miele, it's out of warranty and the repair option are:

1. Pay £250, and if the total repair cost including labour and parts is less than £450, they'll do it. If not, full refund.

2. Pay £123 for the first hour of labour, plus parts. Any time after that is £72/hr broken up into 6 minute intervals. They've also offered a 30% parts discount after some grumbling on my part.

A new John Lewis machine with 3 year guarantee is £500.

Any thoughts? Normally I would've gotten it repaired, but experience says that once it goes, it goes.

Thanks!

lemon26

It's not necessarily true that once it goes, it goes. We had a similar problem with our dryer, altough admittedly a Beko and not a Miele, where when pressed the on button, it would trip the RCD for the circuit that it was on.

A little investigation later and it's quite common for the heating element used by the dryer to fail, which can cause a short circuit, which in turn trips the RCD for your protection.

Could you not try an independent appliance repairer as it's out of warranty anyway? We used our independent repairer and it turns out he's the approved Beko too - although we paid independent rates as we went to him direct, not via Beko customer services.

toffifee

With Meile machines once the initial guarantee has run out you can insure them against breakdown with Domestic and General. I think we pay about £100 per year for our washing machine, so I guess it may be a bit more for the washer/dryer. Might be worth a call to them. When our tumble dryer stopped working they sold me a one year policy with a repair/refund guarantee like the one you describe in point 1 but that may have been only because we had an existing policy on the washing machine.

If you can get the D&G insurance, your first option + 3 years of insurance might come to not much more than a new John Lewis model. Depends whether you think the Meile model would then last longer than the new John Lewis...

mvteng

Personally, I'd pay the £250 for Miele to fix it.

I'm surprised its out of warranty. When we bought both our dishwasher & washing machine, they both came with extended 10 year warranties. With the exception of a small teething fault on the washing machine, they've both been absolutely faultless for the last 7 years.

Assuming the £250 repair comes with a warranty, you'd effectively be getting a high end (4 year old) washer drier for that price.

macman

Get an independent white goods engineer to assess the fault and quote for the repair. Should be no more than £30 to do that-then decide. You don't need to use a Miele agent.
A Miele shoud be good for a lot longer than 4 years.

ryder72

£250 Miele repair option. You have nothing to lose if the repair is over £450. Laundry appliances dont get much better than Miele.

abd08

Thanks to the feedback on here decided to go with the £250 repair.

Nearest Miele independent was nearer £100 to come out an diagnose fault. They were incredibly helpful though, and really influenced my image of the brand, even though they also sell other brands as well, and could have easily steered me towards a new non Miele machine.

As a bonus, was told by Miele that if it is repaired, the whole machine gets a 1 year warranty from that date, so even if a completely unrelated thing goes wrong, it's covered.

Can't ask for more than that. Finger crossed it either breaks again within 12 months, or just keeps working for many years to come!

Thanks

macman

£100 for a call out? Mine charges £20.
As I said, they don't have to be Miele approved to fix a Miele.