Free 10 years parts guarantee isn't !

kpjuk

I have just purchased a Hotpoint Ultima HUE61GS cooker from AppliancesDirect.co.uk. When making the choice one of the factors that influenced us was that their was a 1 year Parts and labour warranty and a 10 year parts warranty.

Having taken delivery and rang the helpline to activate the warranty, I am told that the free parts warranty from years 2-10 is only free if I pay £119.99 for a Hotpoint Engineer to come and fit the parts!

So if I need a replacement oven element (which I can buy for under £25 from many places on the internet) it will cost me a fixed price under this guarantee deal of £119.99. How is this free?

Appliances Direct have a graphic image showing 1 year labour, 10 years parts, but when the cooker arrived the Hotpoint paperwork has a card that says
"Activate your free* 10 year parts guarantee"
The asterisk shown over the page gives the T's & C's that say the free parts are only free if fitted by a Hotpoint engineer at a fixed price of £109.99, although when I rang the activation line I was told that it is £119.99.

This wasn't a crucial decision tipping point for us, but I am fuming that what is advertised on ApplianceDirect is not correct. How can they get away with clarifying that the word FREE is actually NOT FREE,

KPJUK

Aylesbury_Duck

I don't see the problem with the wording - it is correct, the parts are free. The fact that the one year warranty is described as "parts and labour" and the remaining nine years are just parts makes it quite clear in my opinion. Why would they differentiate otherwise? The parts are free from years two to ten, the labour is not. At no point have they described the labour as free (beyond the first year). If they had, it would have been listed as a "10 year parts and labour" warranty.

You do have a point on the £109.99 vs £119.99 difference though. If the terms and conditions in place at the time of sale quoted £109.99 then they should honour that.

Paul_DNAP

Big print - The parts are free.
Small print - The labour and call-out costs are astronomical.
Even bigger print - The parts are free.


It's also heavily implied from them denoting the first year being "parts and labour" and the next 9 described as "parts" only.


So, they aren't doing anything wrong in their adverts (apart from the £110 vs £120 disagreement) the parts will be free if you trigger that warranty and use their own engineer.


(Although it probably has very vague wording about what they consider to be "beyond natural wear and tear" for them to automatically deny anything tricky.)

kpjuk

Hmmmm the parts are only free if you use their engineer to install them so it is very misleading.

If you don't use their engineer the parts are not free.

custardy

kpjuk wrote: »

Hmmmm the parts are only free if you use their engineer to install them so it is very misleading.

If you don't use their engineer the parts are not free.

Thats right. how did you envisage it working.
you call them up and say you have diagnosed the *widget* is broken. send me a new one out?

Aylesbury_Duck

kpjuk wrote: »

Hmmmm the parts are only free if you use their engineer to install them so it is very misleading.

If you don't use their engineer the parts are not free.

It's not misleading, unless you're saying the terms weren't available to you before you purchased?

Weigh up the £120 cost against buying the part and fitting it yourself. Trouble is, if you muck up the fitting, break the new part or the cooker you're fitting it to, it could end up costing a lot more than £120. This way, if you exercise your right to a new part in year two or beyond, you know the price is fixed - for the full ten years in fact - and that if there are any problems, you're not paying for the consequences.

Caz3121

kpjuk wrote: »

Hmmmm the parts are only free if you use their engineer to install them so it is very misleading.

If you don't use their engineer the parts are not free.

that is correct

first year - parts and labour and included
onwards - parts free when fitted by their engineer. Labour not free

If you can find someone to fit it for under £85, get the part yourself and you are £s up.

LilElvis

That doesn't sound too bad at all - many cookers costing ten times what you have paid only come with a couple of years warranty.

davidmcn

There have been people complaining here for over a decade about Hotpoint's parts-free-with-our-labour-charges "guarantee".

But given the only part I've ever had to replace in a cooker is the element, at £7 or so a pop and DIYable, I'd hardly assign much value to such a guarantee anyway.

Aylesbury_Duck

LilElvis wrote: »

That doesn't sound too bad at all - many cookers costing ten times what you have paid only come with a couple of years warranty.

My thoughts exactly. And if the call-out cost is fixed at £120 for ten years...What's that in real terms in ten years' time? £90, perhaps? Whatever it is, it's cheaper as the warranty ages.

DCFC79

kpjuk wrote: »

I have just purchased a Hotpoint Ultima HUE61GS cooker from AppliancesDirect.co.uk. When making the choice one of the factors that influenced us was that their was a 1 year Parts and labour warranty and a 10 year parts warranty.

Having taken delivery and rang the helpline to activate the warranty, I am told that the free parts warranty from years 2-10 is only free if I pay £119.99 for a Hotpoint Engineer to come and fit the parts!

So if I need a replacement oven element (which I can buy for under £25 from many places on the internet) it will cost me a fixed price under this guarantee deal of £119.99. How is this free?

Appliances Direct have a graphic image showing 1 year labour, 10 years parts, but when the cooker arrived the Hotpoint paperwork has a card that says
"Activate your free* 10 year parts guarantee"
The asterisk shown over the page gives the T's & C's that say the free parts are only free if fitted by a Hotpoint engineer at a fixed price of £109.99, although when I rang the activation line I was told that it is £119.99.

This wasn't a crucial decision tipping point for us, but I am fuming that what is advertised on ApplianceDirect is not correct. How can they get away with clarifying that the word FREE is actually NOT FREE,

KPJUK

Nothing wrong here, what you should have done is not buy a cooker based on the 10 years part warranty.