miele washing machine broken - advice?

belfastgirl23

My miele Premier 500 machine just developed a big hole in the rubber seal around the door which obviously causes leaking The machine was bought August 05 and cost £499 and there are only two of us in the house so we obviously don't do a lot of washing...

I phoned miele customer services to ask whether it would be under warranty. They said basically I should get their engineer out and they would decide whether the warranty covered it or not. But it costs £94 just to get them out. So a bit of a risk if they decide it isn't covered.

The other problem is that the local engineer I called about it is having trouble tracking down the part anyway which I know to be true because I wasn't able to find it myself on the net.

Anyone been in a situation like this or able to offer any insights into miele customer service (which is supposed to be award winning). Or indeed any other advice would be very welcome. The washing is already piling up

kwatt

Hi belfastgirl,

This is the issue I have with Miele, they basically hold you to ransom on spares and technical data.

You will be able to get a seal, we can get them on UK Whitegoods, but don't expect it to be cheap by any stretch. It's unusual to get a Miele door seal for less than £50 and most suppliers shy away from it as, if you get it wrong, it's an expensive mistake as well as a nightmare to get the part in the first place.

Good machines sure, good backup service is debatable dependent on where you live but with both, you pay for it.

HTH

K.

mvteng

Our door seal had the same problem.

Miele replaced without any problems. No mention of a £94 call out charge. They just sent a guy out. He looked at it, said "yep, you need a new door seal" & came back in a week when the seal came into stock.

I don't understand why you think it might not be under warranty. If the machine is still in warranty, & the seal develops a fault not of your making, then it should be covered.

If however, you've ripped the seal by accident, I can understand why a charge would be made. In that case lots of cups of tea & biscuits for the service engineer should be cheaper than £94!

belfastgirl23

Just had a not very helpful conversation with a miele service rep. I explained the situation, she first of all told me that door seals were a grey area. When I pushed her a bit her next step was to establish it was my fault re the cleaning products I had used. When that didn't work she told me that with it being out of guarantee by six months they couldn't do anything. When I asked to speak to the next level up she suddenly realised that I had an irish accent and should be speaking to miele ireland who helpfully close at 5pm. Kind of a bit cross about it since I am rapidly running out of clean clothes (being a low maintenance kinda gal and not having loads of stuff). So much for their award winning customer service!

PS MVteng the machine is 2 and a half years old and I think the warranty when I bought was for 2 years....

mvteng

If its out of warranty its out of warranty.

However, when we bought ours it was sold on being of the finest long term quality so I would be really miffed if the seal went after 2-1/2 years.

Ours went after about 1 year.

When our seal went it went gradually. First of all it had rub marks, then we started finding little pieces of rubber in our washing, until finally it wore through into a hole. As above, Miele couldnt have been more helpful (although ours was still within warranty). The engineer had seen the problem before although he did say it wasn't common.

Sorry I can't be more helpful

belfastgirl23

Tried miele Ireland this morning who were having none of the seal being a grey area (pardon the pun!) and said it explicitly is not covered by the guarantee, which is different from the other 2 reps...

Anyway an engineer is coming out week after next (my choice, I'm away next week) - when I pushed the CS rep she said he would assess it but said the damage was probably caused by us. Her suggestion was a bra underwire (def not possible since I don't do underwires) or a zip. Both seem unlikely to me in any case since they would need to be very strong to take out a rubber seal....
Currently handwashing and spinning in the machine lengthy process but at least it works!

kwatt

Hi belfastgirl,

It is most probably (like virtually 100%) that if a door seal is torn then it has been something that has been put in the machine that's done it. TBH there's virtually no other explanation for it I'm afraid so the assumption is always just that when you talk to a service department. The problem that they have is that, with most manufacturers, this may well not be covered even in warranty just like coin damage and a host of other "user faults" and best practice dictates that we have to make people aware that it may be chargeable to them in any event irrespective of any warranty if this is the case. If it's not and it turns out to be a fault with the machine, great, everyone is happy.

What you have to remember is that, whilst that drum is zapping around at about 1400 revolutions per second there's a fair old bit of force placed on the drum and all the bits around it. It's really easy for even a zip (especially if the machine is overloaded) to tear a gasket to shreds in a few seconds.

Between the front of the cabinet and the drum there is usually nothing but fresh air and the seal itself, there's not usually anything there that can catch or rip the seal which, as I said earlier, means that it is almost always (in fact usually without exception) a user generated fault. There are a few machines that are different, but Miele isn't one of them.

HTH

K.

davethetaller

kwatt wrote: »

Hi belfastgirl,

It is most probably (like virtually 100%) that if a door seal is torn then it has been something that has been put in the machine that's done it. TBH there's virtually no other explanation for it I'm afraid so the assumption is always just that when you talk to a service department. The problem that they have is that, with most manufacturers, this may well not be covered even in warranty just like coin damage and a host of other "user faults" and best practice dictates that we have to make people aware that it may be chargeable to them in any event irrespective of any warranty if this is the case. If it's not and it turns out to be a fault with the machine, great, everyone is happy.

What you have to remember is that, whilst that drum is zapping around at about :rotfl: 1400 revolutions per second :rotfl: there's a fair old bit of force placed on the drum and all the bits around it. It's really easy for even a zip (especially if the machine is overloaded) to tear a gasket to shreds in a few seconds.

Between the front of the cabinet and the drum there is usually nothing but fresh air and the seal itself, there's not usually anything there that can catch or rip the seal which, as I said earlier, means that it is almost always (in fact usually without exception) a user generated fault. There are a few machines that are different, but Miele isn't one of them.

HTH

K.

And here am I, thinking that 1400 revolutions per minute, was quick !

kwatt

Oops.

K.