Fire alert over 3 million tumble dryers

NEARLY 3 million owners of Whirlpool tumble dryers have been told not to use their machines after the firm backtracked on its previous advice that they were safe to use.

Following an intervention by trading standards officers, the maker of Hotpoint, Indesit and Creda tumble dryers is urging customers affected by a safety scandal to unplug their machines until they have been fixed by an engineer. For the past 15 months, Whirlpool had been assuring customers that the machines were safe to use as long as they were at home and not asleep. During this time a number of house fires have been linked to tumble dryers, prompting calls from consumer bodies for Whirlpool to be investigated by officials.

Experts described Whirlpool’s handling of the situation as “appalling” while consumer bodies including Which? called for all dryers to be recalled and consumers refunded.

Whirlpool is in the process of replacing or repairing an estimated 4 million potentially faulty machines across the UK after identifying a safety issue in 2015. Since then Whirlpool has fixed around 1.3 million machines, meaning nearly 3 million people still have a potentially dangerous dryer. In December, Whirlpool told customers they could expect to wait six months for a repair.

A Whirlpool spokesman said: “We have consistently responded to the advice of Trading Standards and continue to do so. Trading Standards have confirmed that our actions to date in this campaign have been undertaken diligently and responsibly.”