In a press release we picked up this morning it is reported that consumers are being overcharged 50% of the time by repair firms offering fixed prices which include parts, says Midlands-based appliance repair company Domestic Heroes Limited.
This conclusion is exactly what many of our trade members have been telling us for the past year or so, fixed price repairs are a very expensive way to get a repair and you can read a lot more on the subject in article on here about fixed price repairs and cover+1. Some repairers saying that many of the most common repairs can cost up to three times the price that they would have charged had the customer called them directly. It’s an expensive mistake many customers won’t make twice, even if it looks like a good deal up front.
Domestic Heroes have analysed the details of their visits to hundreds of appliances over the past six months and found that 50% of machines were repaired with no need for any parts. With a typical fixed price deal on a washing machine from a large national repairer costing £125 or more, and a labour-only repair typically costing around £60, appliance owners could be paying twice as much as they need to.
Examples of problems which do not require parts include blocked pumps, leaks from the filler hose, incorrect loads, low water pressure, and foreign objects. Engineers have encountered all kinds of foreign objects which were preventing machines from operating correctly including bracelets, coins, metal rulers, and even MP3 players. Wires from underwired bras are a particular problem, and Domestic Heroes advise that any clothing with metal wiring should be washed in a laundry bag to prevent damage to the machine should the wires escape.
“No one likes to read the manual, but sometimes it can save a lot of time, stress, and unnecessary expense,” says Adam , one of Domestic Heroes’ engineers. “We often find that people have installed their machines in places which are just not right for them – like putting tumble dryers in the garage where it is too cold for them to work properly.”
Installation faults are also common, both where people have installed machines for themselves, but also where other firms have been in too much of a hurry to move on to the next job without testing the machine first. Most engineers see several calls a month where retaining bolts or transit packaging have been left in a machine, causing all kinds of problems from strange smells to washing machines bouncing around the kitchen.
With so many repairs not requiring parts, and others requiring simple parts that they carry with them, most engineers clear two-thirds of calls on the first visit, and 85% by the second visit.