Hotpoint Dryer broke less than 1 month outside 12 month warranty!

rae1202

i keep having a problem with hotpoint washer plastic bits in drum keep breaking..........got 5 years parts warrenty but was told today this only applies if i pay for the engineer i told them the warrenty was rubbish and i will not get hotpoint again the customer service is terrible and i wont even like to win anything with hotpoint connections

kwatt

stephen25uk wrote: »

i am sure hotpoint warranty is 1 year for parts and labour...and 5 years for parts...so 89 quid seems a bit much for an engineer to come and fix it as it should just be his labour to pay for

Hi Steven,

That's what the bit about aftersales service is all about here in this article, basically people are held to ransom and limited to using only the manufacturer's service at whatever they see fit to charge.

It's interesting that a major insurer find that the independents average charge to repair, including parts, is about £70 and yet Hotpoint, Hoover, Whirlpool and Miele (plus others) all charge much more than this for labour only. Trouble is, you don't find out until something goes wrong and people thing that they're getting something for free, in this case a parts warranty, which I can assure you, you're not.

K.

stan747

my wife used to work for comet and they used domestic and general for warranties, they do include parts and labour and you don't have the hassle of paying and trying to get your money back. you can arrange a warranty with them directly no matter who you buy the appliance from, worth considering for future purchases.

Joto_2

A warranty doesn't mean anything in law. Most companies seem to offer this as standard, whether it is for a £20 kettle or a £5000 kitchen. The item has to last a 'reasonable' amount to time. i'd ask the company if they think there Dryer should last longer than 12 months and if they/you do then you can argue the point.
I'd send a recorded letter saying that you would expect a dryer to last longer than 13 months and give them the usual 28 days to either repair or replace and after that time you'll have no alternative but to seek legal advice.

eslick

The cost of £89 is their standard call out charge, I had a a similar issue with both a washer and dryer. For the dryer it was cheaper to get someone out of the local paper to fix it. We had an issue with our washer one of the bolts sheered off that holds the weight down, Hotpoint Customer Service were useless wouldnt offer anything and made us pay for an extended warranty to fix it.

Also had problems with a Hotpoint dishwasher.

Up shot of all of this is I wouldnt buy another hotpoint or a product from their group of companys again their customer service is the worst in the world.

BritBrat

I think under EU legislation everyone has two years warranty.

I will try and find a link to the page.

Directive 1999/44/EC

(17)

Whereas it is appropriate to limit in time the period
during which the seller is liable for any lack of
conformity which exists at the time of delivery of the
goods; whereas Member States may also provide for a
limitation on the period during which consumers can
exercise their rights, provided such a period does not
expire within two years from the time of delivery;
whereas where, under national legislation, the time when
a limitation period starts is not the time of delivery of
the goods, the total duration of the limitation period
provided for by national law may not be shorter than
two years from the time of delivery.

Here is another link that may be of interest:

High Priority in Europe

Warranty has a very high priority in Europe. The European Commission and European Parliament have a program under the headline of consumer protection until 2007. One of the consequences of this has been a high burden of cost, which must be borne by the producers. Here are some examples:
Directive 1999/44/EC (Directive on certain aspects of the sale of consumer goods and associated guarantees) states in Article 2 that "The seller must deliver goods to the consumer which are in conformity with the contract of sale."

This is the case if the goods:

1. "comply with the description given by the seller and possess the qualities of the goods which seller has held out to consumers as a sample or mode;
2. are fit for any particular purpose for which the consumer requires them and which he made known to the seller at the time of conclusion of the contract and which the seller has accepted;
3. are fit for the purposes for which goods of the same type are normally used;
4. show the quality and performance which are normal in goods of the same type and which the consumer can reasonably expect, given the nature of the goods and taking into account any public statement of the specific characteristics of the goods made about them by the seller, the producer or his representative, particular in advertising or on labeling."

Under this directive, as transposed into the national laws of most of the member states, the minimum warranty period of two years for consumer goods is mandatory. However, this has not uniformly extended warranty periods. In some cases it has shortened them. For instance, under the regime of this directive, most of the German automobile manufacturers have reduced formerly more lengthy warranty periods to the statutory minimum.
In addition to this directive, the Commission is expected to issue a directive against unfair business practices and unfair contract clauses, which will be relevant under European competition law.
Noncompliance with Directive 1999/44/EC means nonperformance with a contract clause, triggering liabilities for the seller in terms of the obligation to replace, repair, reduce the purchase price and/or compensate the buyer for damages. The seller basically has the same recourse back into its supply chain.

http://www.warrantyweek.com/archive/ww20040629.html

I am no expert in this but that's what I have thought for a long time and read of people quoting the legislation when they had a problem with goods within two years.

kwatt

BritBrat,

If you read what is in the sections quoted carefully you will see that this is a warranty of conformity, not of durability. The two are mutually exclusive.

What we have in the UK is consumer legislation which allows up to 6 years or 5 years in Scotland to make a claim against a retailer for non-conformity to a contract. That is to say as I understand it, that the goods requested differed from those supplied or were not suitable for the task requested. And, obviously, this actually exceeds the requirements of the EU Directive by a considerable margin.

This does not state anywhere that the goods have to meet a quality or durability criteria as, quite simply, they don't and that was not the purpose of this legislation.

The same applies here with the 5 & 6 year thing that I see quoted on here and other boards almost every single day, it is not a warranty of durability and to think so is incorrect. It does not guarantee that the goods will last that length of time or offer you any warranty against breakdown costs, period, end of story.

The purpose of this legislation was to offer more harmonisation across the EU when it comes to consumer rights not to offer an all encompassing two year warranty on the goods themselves but more to ensure that traders acted in a responsible manner.

If what you propose was true then almost every manufacturer and retailer in the UK is in breach of this directive and that is simply so remote a possibility as to be considered impossible.

This all kicked off in the late 90's and the press had a field day as the directive was misinterpreted as being what you think it is, it is not what it was made out to be and does not give anyone the right to a two year warranty. As I said in that article I posted, the two year EU warranty is a myth, it simply does not exist.

HTH

K.

maplegirl2011

has the dryer had any previous repairs. my hotpoint dryer had broke down 4 times in the first year and when it broke for the 5th time after 13mths i got an engineer sent out free because it was a similar fault and the previous repairs were still under warranty. the chap wrote the machine off and phoned his office and told them i had been to trading standards etc and had small claims court papers to fill in. they told him to replace so he just changed the purchase date on his laptop to within the 12mth warranty and i got a replacement.

edina

rae1202 wrote: »

i keep having a problem with hotpoint washer plastic bits in drum keep breaking..........got 5 years parts warrenty but was told today this only applies if i pay for the engineer i told them the warrenty was rubbish and i will not get hotpoint again the customer service is terrible and i wont even like to win anything with hotpoint connections

I've just ordered another 2 drum paddles this morning!! i only replaced one of them just under 2 weeks ago. They aren't strong at all:mad:

miketrim

I read this thread with interest as I am in dispute with Samsung over a camcorder that 13 months old and has gone wrong.

The advice I got was to phone the retailer up and explain the problem. This gives them an opportunity to offer a repair. If they arent forthcoming ( i presume most wont be) then to send them a letter as detailed on the consumer direct website, claiming your rights under the sale of good act 1979.