Household Electrical Appliances

Category: Buying

  • Electrical toy safety warnings

    Sadly there are many bogus toys out on the market and spotting which ones are genuine and which ones are fake is getting harder and harder. With electrical items, you need to be particularly vigilant as if they go wrong, they can easily start a fire. No longer can you just check the toy for the CE mark, as these are also being faked, but you may need to spend a little time investigating the toy to check that it appears to be safe? If the toy takes batteries and is suitable for children of a young age then the battery compartment should not be accessible. If a child swallows a battery either watch sized or AA/AAA, for example, this can cause serious health issues and can even be fatal. If you inspect a toy which is supposed to be suitable for a three year old for example, and the batteries are easily accessible, then the chances are it is a fake and is not suitable.

    It is not only toys that are being faked but every sort of electrical item from phones through to vacuum cleaners. If you have any doubt in the authenticity of an electrical item, you should contact the manufacturer who will be able to check the serial numbers etc or failing this contact trading standards.

  • What to look out for when buying catering electrical appliances

    When buying electrical appliances that have been designed for commercial use, there are a certain number of things that you need to be aware of. If you are looking at installing a pizza oven for example, in your home or in a small industrial/commercial building then you will first need to check it will work.

    Every property that has electricity coming into it will either be provided with phase one or phase three.  Phase three offers more power so is often only found in larger commercial units that require more power on a daily basis. Many commercial appliances are designed to work with phase 3 supply for this reason and therefore cannot be used in a supply that is only phase one. You also need to check that you have sufficient space on your current circuit to add the appliance and that you will not be overloading the circuit as this will cause it to trip out every time. It is worth checking all the requirements of the appliance you are looking to buy first and consulting an electrician if you are unsure as to whether it will be able to be added to the fuse board.

  • Should you buy second hand appliances?

    If you are looking for electrical appliances then you may be tempted by the huge saving you can make by buying them second hand. There are many places to buy second hand electrical appliances such as Ebay, Gumtree, Facebook or at a car boot sale, but you need to be aware of the risks you may be taking.

    If you are buying something from a seller that has refurbished the item then you may well get a warranty, but if buying privately then you may find that you have little cover and could end up wasting your money.

    Buying items from a car boot is often the most risky as you will not have any way of contacting the person should the item not work and often you cannot test it until you get home.

    You can save money on buying items second hand but if you are still talking about spending over a hundred pounds then I would seriously consider whether it is worth the risk, you may find by spending just a little bit more you can get yourself a 12 month warranty and have peace of mind should it not work or go wrong in the near future.

     

  • In car phone holders

    The market is inundated with car phone holders. There is such a wide choice available it can be very hard to know which sort to get. Some car phone holders have suction pads on the back which you can attach to the window screen, others have clips that clip on to your air vents and some plug into your power socket point. You can even get special mats or sticky pads which you can attach to your dashboard and place the phone on. Although the phone will stick to the pad, they claim not to leave any sticky residue on the phone.

    Some of these products work better than others and while some may work brilliantly to start with, often after a while they don’t grip as well.

    You may have to buy a product and try it before you can decide if it works as it should, but if it doesn’t stay in position or doesn’t hold your phone then you should be entitled to return it for a refund or exchange.

     

     

  • Finding great deals on electrical appliances

    The beauty of the internet allows you to easily compare prices of electrical goods very quickly. If you know what model or make of an appliance you want, you can simply type it in to Google and view the shopping results to see the prices that many stores are selling it for. This will often allow you to save a decent amount and even see stores that currently have the product on offer.

    Even if you don’t know the exact model of an appliance you need, you can sometimes search for one and then find links to similar models that may be suitable. It may be that you find a cheaper model that still has all the functionality that you need that you didn’t even know existed.

    Some stores offer a price match scheme too, so if you find it online but wanted to buy it from a store and collect it you may be able to get a price match.