Several days late and who knows how many dollars short, Bosch is blitzing the purchasers in its records with recorded telephone calls to let them know their fancy dishwashers may set fire to the house. An overheating part has caused something upwards of 50 incidents, of which 30 (or more) have caused property damage. Well…those figures are as of last January, when the recall went out.
Because I let my subscription to Consumer Reports lapse, I didn’t hear about this until the company’s phone robot occupied some space on my voicemail.
Naturally, not only do I have one of those in my house, M’hijito and I bought one for the downtown house. Both of machines seem to have been recalled.
Yesterday I called the toll-free number and was told to quit using the machine (yeah. right!), to wait until they get around to sending the part, and then call Sears and wait until they get around to sending someone to repair the thing. Of course, I didn’t have the model and serial numbers for M’hijito’s dishwasher, so that means I’m now sitting interminably on the Bosch’s hold button. At least they pump classical music into your ear, instead of the usual drech.
What’s annoying about this is not that they installed a defective part in God only knows how many units but that they waited until mid-August to blanket the country with phone calls. It means both my son and I (among who knows how many other hapless consumers) have been using a hazardous appliance for at least eight months. Don’t know about you, but I often turn on the dishwasher and then leave the house, or turn it on right before I go to bed. To frost that cookie, this could not be a worse time to have to deal with Sears’s often rude and usually difficult service department! Classes start the week after next; I’ve got to go to six meetings next week, plus of course I’m supposed to show up at work, of all the ridiculous things!
So I’m less than perfectly thrilled at the prospect of waiting around from 8:00 to noon or 1:00 to 5:00 for some Sears guy to show up, knowing he probably won’t show up in that window.
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Just got through on the phone to one Chris, a CSR of considerable charm. Mercifully, the second dishwasher is not on the recall list. Good: only one round of the Workman Waltz, not two.
Well, I’m glad to know about the hazard and glad to have them fix it for free. But I sure do wish they’d clued me when it came up…eight months ago! If you have a Bosch and haven’t heard about this, better check out the recall notice. The phone number to call, if you think your model might be among the recalled, is 1-800-856-9226.