Whether you are a landlord who supplies appliances to a tenant in a rental property or a homeowner who has bought their own appliances, there is one thing we are all guilty of when it comes to registering those appliance. We don’t!
Almost every home appliance we buy has a sticker on it encouraging us to register the appliance, often offering a free extended warranty in exchange for our popping online and completing a form. The majority of us look at this activity with cynicism. Surely the item is guaranteed under consumer law and all the manufacturer wants is our contact details? We will then get bombarded with letters in the post, text messages and emails. So, we think, there is no point in registering the item. We’re sure it is covered anyway and it avoids the plethora of messages that we really don’t want. That’s not the whole story, though and there are some really important reasons why we should all be registering the home appliances that we buy. In this article we will take a look at why you should reconsider registering your home appliances. PS you can also opt out of receiving those sometimes-irksome marketing messages.
Why you need to register your home appliances
The most important reason for registering a new home appliance is so that the manufacturer does have your contact details, but this isn’t so that they can bombard you with marketing messages. There is one very important reason and that is to do with appliance safety. We’ve all heard the horror stories of an appliance that suddenly caught fire or exploded without any warning haven’t we? Often, though, the appliances that this happens to, will have had a safety recall placed against them by the manufacturer as the fault has been identified and there is a fix for the issue or the manufacturer wants to offer a replacement item. If the manufacturer does not have your details, then they have no way of warning or contacting you. You or your tenant is then placed at potentially serious risk. Safety recalls are rare but they do happen and when they do it is because there is a serious safety issue with the appliance.
It’s not too late to register your home appliance
The Association of Manufacturers of Domestic Appliances which represents over 80% of the UK appliance industry carried out a survey which showed that of the 210 million appliances in UK homes in 2018, less than 50% were registered. That is over 100 million untraceable appliances out there. The trade body states that most manufacturers will allow registration of products that are more than 12 months old and some will allow registration of appliances up to 12 years old. Registration for over 60 of the main UK appliance manufacturers is a simple process and can be done on one single website: The Register my Appliance website.
So, next time you purchase a household appliance and you are thinking twice about whether to register, remember that registration has a much more important safety reason than you would imagine and it is more than simply allowing a manufacturer to send marketing emails. It takes just a few minutes and could be the difference between your or your tenant’s safety and serious damage or injury.
