Mini fridge not cold enough, manufacturer test states instead that my unit is very cold, what now?

Al_Ross

Undervalued said:

erik85 said:

JJ_Egan said:

Consumer Rights act  apply to the vendor not the manufacturer .

Who did you actually buy from .

If you are claiming against the vendor under CR then you would need to prove your assertions via an independent report .

The vendor is Amazon. So how do I get an independent report? I would need to look for a professional fridge engineer perhaps? I can imagine the costs for having him/her over and produce the report would be on me and would not be refunded even if the fridge is deemed unsatisfactory? Also, am I right in thinking that as we are now 7 months later than when the unit was purchased, if the report deems the unit unsatisfactory, I probably wouldn't get the total amount I paid for?

No. If the report finds that the item is faulty then the seller will have to reimburse you for the reasonable cost of the report in addition to properly repairing the fridge.

John Lewis refused to cover my report on a faulty product which had an inherrant fault,they claimed the reports are not covered by the retailer,but they possibly didn't know what they were speaking about.

coffeehound

erik85 said:

Sorry, how am I being harsh? Again, I had the fridge for months. I could experience it under performed, for a very long time. I was patient, as it was summer and god forbid the room temperature perhaps was too high at 25C; but as the colder temperatures drew in, there hasn't been an improvement.
My thermometer tests the mini fridge at 11C, when the exact same thermometer is placed in our main fridge, it reads 3C.
Drinks in the mini fridge were without a doubt luke-cold.
I treat the fridge with the care of a baby as it was so under-performing (i.e. no hot drinks put inside, any room temperature item would have been stored in our main fridge to get to a cold temperature so to not over stress the unit, we distanced the unit from the wall to make sure there was enough breathing space, spent just so much time in trying to balance the loads inside, etc), and then I am told I am being harsh because I label as under performing a 190 GBP compressor fridge unit which is only capable of delivering 11C in a room of 19C?

Sorry, I don't think I am harsh at all.

@erik85 can you link to the item.  Is it a third-party selling through amazon?  I tend to believe your results and would not put it past some box-mover to falsify a test report to avoid losing multiple sales of a duff product.

I would first tell the seller that you will get Trading Standards involved if they refuse a refund

Alderbank

We all believe Erik's results. But there are sound reasons for believing that the fridge is working properly now. For instance, refrigeration fluids are known to behave oddly if the unit is tilted or shaken, such as in transit.
There is no point in the seller returning a 'duff' product. Erik will have it tested and the seller will bear all those extra carriage costs and testing costs.

You could tell the seller that you will get Trading Standards involved if they refuse a refund, but that will tell them you don't know your rights.
Firstly, as Citizens Advice say, Trading Standards can take businesses to court or stop them operating, but they won’t help you fix your problem - for example, they can’t help you get a refund.
Second, if you ask TSO they will tell you you are not entitled yet to demand a refund. First you will have to produce an independent report that the unit is faulty. The seller can then choose to repair or replace instead of refund.

erik85

@coffeehound @Alderbank @MarvinDay
Thanks for the further replies. Just to wrap up on this.

I agree that refrigeration units can behave oddly if they have been shaken excessively in transit, however my experience had been built over having the fridge for more than six months and a constant degradation of the temperatures the fridge could keep.

If I had had accepted to receive the fridge back from the manufacturer and test it myself again etc., I would have incurred in extra time spent on it, time that I would have never got back, never ever. Assuming that the fridge had kept being a dud, even if I had taken the manufacturer to court, that would have meant more time spent on the matter, again time that I would have never got back.

Thankfully for me the matter has been resolved by Amazon, had to speak to two members of the CS and they understood my concerns and refunded me the whole amount the following day.
Even though I tend to loath Amazon, I am actually extremely pleased to see how they handled the matter and made efforts to understand my concerns.

@coffeehound as you were asking, it is the Subcold LED, the 50 size if I recall correctly.
There is tons of good reviews, hence why I trusted purchasing that brand/model.
If you filter on the 1star ones though, you will see that there is a handful of reports stating the same issue as mine, with the fridge progressively becoming useless. Whether it is a design fault and all the 5-stars never bother to report back, or whether it is a case of 1 out of a 1000 fridges being duds, which is absolutely understandable, I am not sure of course.
Point is, mine was indeed not working regardless of what a manufacturer-issued report stated, report which by nature is not representative of the problem that I flagged, having monitored the fridge over a couple of days when the issue manifests after months of usage.