Don’t Risk It, Register Your Electrical Appliances

Do you register all of your electrical appliances? Shockingly, only 23% of people always register their products.

When you’ve bought a new electrical product, you automatically check that all the pieces are there, everything’s working correctly and then you get stuck in playing with your brand-new device. However, before you get lost in your new gadget, you need to remember to register your electrical product as, if the item you’ve purchased is actually faulty or dangerous, the manufacturers can easily get in contact with you and inform you.

Electrical products such as chargers, adapters, kettles, haircare appliances etc. are recalled more than you think but only 10-20% of these are actually returned and/or repaired and this is due to the fact that the manufacturer has no way of directly getting in touch with the owners of these products as these people haven’t registered their product, because of this, millions of potentially unsafe products are still being used today putting the owners at risk of electrical shock, fires or even death.

What should you be registering?

You should be registering anything that is electrical, including large household items such as dishwashers and washing machines to smaller items such as kettles and microwaves. This also includes any haircare appliances such as straighteners and hairdryers. Anything that has an electric current running through it, get it registered!

How do you register your electrical products?

To register your electrical devices, head over to the Register My Appliance website which links to all major electronics manufacturers. All you need to know to register your product is the brand name, the model of your product (which could be a name or number), serial number (usually between 10-16 digits) and approximately the date you purchased your device.

What happens if one of your appliances is recalled?

If one of your appliances has been recalled and you have registered this product then you should be notified by the manufacturer via email and within that notification, you should be given details of what you should do next. If this isn’t the case, you should contact the seller or head over to the Citizens Advice website for help.

If you purchased the product in the UK, then you should be able to find some advice on the Citizens Advice website and if you bought it from a company based in the EU then the European law will protect you, however, if your product was purchased outside of the UK and EU then it’s unlikely that those laws will protect you.

It’s possible to find out if any of your electrical products have been recalled in the past by heading over to the Electrical Safety First product recalls page and here you can check if any specific items have been recalled. Their product checker contains the details of electrical products that have been recalled since 2007 so if you search for a product and it hasn’t popped up, you’re more than likely going to be ok using it!

If you ever have any concerns about an electrical product you’re using, always contact the seller and/or manufacturer for advice.