Using The Forum 101

If you want to get free help and try to find out what is wrong with your appliance then there’s a few things that you should know to ensure you get the best results possible.

We want to help you!

The guys are really good, many of them extremely knowledgeable in the field but, they’re not mystical beings with superhuman powers and they need information from you in order to help you.

The most important things you need to supply are:

• Make

• Model number

• Serial number/product codes if possible

• A clear description of the problem and/or symptoms

After that any additional information can help like, what you’ve tried and what you have seen or noticed.

  Why Model Info Is Needed

With the make, model and serial or production codes the guys can look up the machine and see what the layout or format is, see if there’s any technical bulletins and so on. If you don’t give them that they won’t be able to look all that information up.

They also will struggle to tell you what parts are needed, if they can do so.

  Why Fault Descriptions Are Needed

People guess.

Often, they guess wrong.

So if you tell the guys what you see, what the symptoms are then they will often have a fair idea of possible causes. Without that it gets hard for them.

If your machine stops art a certain point, doesn’t heat, doesn’t fill, drain or whatever just tell them that and they’ll try to work out possible causes.

The more accurate you are, the more accurate they will be.

  Plain English

Please, please post stuff in real English.

Break it up, use paragraphs and spacing, sentences and so on as one big long slab of text is extremely off-putting and difficult to read. Some of the people that may be able to help may well not even bother to trawl through it trying to work it out and put together what you are trying to say.

A few minutes making it legible can elicit far more and better responses.

  Private Messaging Members

Please don’t private message (PM) members unless they specifically ask you to do so.

Largely random PMs are ignored by most members and they are often regarded as spam.

You might think that sending a direct message would get you a fast and direct response but you would be wrong. You will actually get a better response and, often from another member or even members that have encountered the issue you have or, have more experience with that product by using the forum rather than the PM system.

In short, your best chance of the fastest and best answers is to use the forums, not private messages.

  Bumping Posts

If you’ve had no response after a day or two by all means post a simple, “does anyone have a clue” about this.

There are some appliance that are extremely difficult to get info on and it may well be that nobody can help but, just as common is that someone that may be able to help just hasn’t seen your post.

Do keep in mind though that the people in the forum do this for free to help you and, they do have a day job that puts food on their table so, don’t always expect instant responses from what is a totally free service.