I was one of “experts” that Bosch sent out to replace the control units in their dishwashers, I can only hope that Hotpoint do not adopt the same cheapskate strategy.
I applied for the job via Manpower at £9.33p an hour because no “experience necessary” and “full training given.” I had no electrical experience but I could at least use a screwdriver.
The “full training” amounted to a day in a hotel near Newbury where I was shown how to dismantle two types of dishwasher and replace the main control unit, i.e the bit behind the front panel buttons. Most of the day was spent explaining how to fill in the paperwork. Without exception, all of us on the course were professionals in other fields (plumbers, builders etc ) who due to the recession were unable to find work in their chosen occupations. This of course made us more plausible to the customer in that the guy at the door knew what he was doing and that alone seemed to be Manpower’s sole selection criteria,
I started work the following day with a basic toolkit and from day one I was assigned 8 jobs per day via email.
Because of the incompetent dispatching system, I sometimes drove over 200 miles in a day with other engineers travelling to my own local area as I did to theirs, and so every job I did had to be completed in 15 minutes to give me any chance of finishing my day in time. Some days I simply couldn’t complete the allotted jobs and that resulted in threats of the sack. My work was checked only once by my supervisor accompanying me on a call to check that I ran the correct post installation checks. Other engineers told me that due to the time pressures, they sometimes bluffed these tests to buy more time. I can say hand on heart that I never did this myself.
I fixed over 400 dishwashers in my time working for Bosch and in around 50% of cases the control unit I removed and the fixed wiring showed obvious signs of over heating. We were told on pain of dismissal to either hide the old unit or if impossible, explain to the customers that the browning of the predominantly white plastic units was caused by “general aging” of the plastic rather than that they had been living with a time bomb incendiary device. I advised every customer to NEVER use the dishwasher unattended or overnight on the subterfuge that “sometimes it can carry on running and burn more electricity”. My supervisor criticised me for this but I could do nothing else, I met many nice people who didn’t deserve to be burned to death in their beds. The units themselves are in my opinion, cheap and shoddily made and there is no protection for the rest of the unit should as it has in so many tragic cases it burst into flames.
The replacement units appeared to be identical to the units being replaced and so again in my opinion, all this exercise actually achieved was to give the customer a false sense of security and to delay what may well be the inevitable over time.
There is a clear design fault and Bosch should have corrected the fault and replaced EVERY dishwasher they had sold, I do guess however that the shareholders wouldn’t have liked that too much.
HOTPOINT and MANPOWER take note. The safety of your customers is NOT negotiable to save money.
Very interesting Colin and thanks for posting your experience. It would be more relevant to the Bosch, Neff and Siemens dishwashers fire risk safety notice though I appreciate your point about hoping Hotpoint weren’t the same.
I didn’t realise manufacturers were recruiting non-engineers especially to carry out modifications, though I suppose when many tens of thousands of appliances suddenly need urgently modifying their normal network of engineers can’t possibly cope. I wouldn’t expect the replacements weren’t genuinely modified though. They may well look identical but the modification would be internal.
Your experience is exactly the type of thing I talked about in my Why so many repair horror stories? article where many engineers are put under ridiculous pressure which results in some engineers abandoning safety checks and cutting many corners through sheer lack of time.