Whirring fridge freezer - manufacturer giving me the runaround

[aroominyork]

18 months ago I bought American style fridge freezer (this model). I have a two year warranty. I have already had two call outs to replace a faulty/sticking door. It has now begun an intermittent, but increasingly frequent, whirring round which stops when you open the door. Hisense's advice is to "manually defrost the appliance for 24h; make sure that appliance is plugged out of the electricity, leave the doors open and place shallow dish bellow so that your floor is protected. We highly recommend as a manufacturer for our customers to perform the 24h defrosting of the appliance at least once or twice a year, so we would prevent things like these from happening."

This is ridiculous. Moden freezers do not need defrosting and the appliance is marketed as “Total no frost: no frost, anywhere – ever! It provides a suitable condition which keeps food fresh and nutritious longer as no frost can be found in refrigerator, which means you don’t need to waste your cherish time to defrost.”

I am sure they are trying to give me the runaround until the warranty expires in November. Can I please have some advice about the likely cause of the whirring and what I should expect as a lasting repair? Or does it indicate the appliance is fundamentally faulty and I should want a replacement/refund?

 

[newfutile]

the warranty does not matter , the consumer rights act 2015 is the law .
there may be parts that may freeze up or the defrost heater may not be working for some reason, best to try the advice given .
your contract is with the supplier not the manufacturer

 

[aroominyork]

the warranty does not matter , the consumer rights act 2015 is the law .
there may be parts that may freeze up or the defrost heater may not be working for some reason, best to try the advice given .
your contract is with the supplier not the manufacturer

Does the Consumer Rights Act apply more than a year after purchase?

My concern about running a defrost is that if it works they will say "your problem is solved". But my view is that if it works, it could build up frost again and again - a successful defrost would almost prove that it is faulty.

 

[snowhead]

The whirring sound is possibly ice / frost catching on the fan.
The fan is turned off when the door is opened to stop cold air being blown out.

The noise could also be due to bent fan blades and need a replacement, so it would seem HiSense are just trying to save an unnecessary call out if it is only ice.

To me it seems simpler to do as they ask and defrost it, rather than them come out, find that it is frost and then charge you for the visit.

It won't be totally frost free for ever if the door(s) is / are left open too long.

 

[aroominyork]

Sorry if I am being dense, but if ice is building up – that is the same as frost, is that right? – then doesn’t it mean there is a fault which is causing the frost to build up since we use it correctly and do not leave the door open?

Is it acceptable for them to say a “Total no frost: no frost, anywhere – ever!” appliance should be defrosted at least once or twice a year? We have no second freezer or other way to store the freezer’s contents for 24 hours.

 

[James]

Just defrost it, return it to service and if the problem is fixed then you have a complaint letter to write about how it is not living up to there advertising.

if it is not fixed, you have a fault that they need to come out and asses.

 

[aroominyork]

Just defrost it, return it to service and if the problem is fixed then you have a complaint letter to write about how it is not living up to there advertising.

if it is not fixed, you have a fault that they need to come out and asses.

That's exactly my point. If a defrost temporarily fixes it, they will reply to my letter "sorry you had a problem, glad it is now OK". Then if it happens again next year it will be out of warranty.

 

[James]

Take it back to the store you bought it from?

 

[aroominyork]

Take it back to the store you bought it from?

That was earlier question... whether the Consumer Rights Act applies more than a year after I bought it?

 

[Simon47]

Yes, consumer rights last more than a year. Goods must be "reasonably durable", and fit for the purpose for which they are sold. There is no laid down limit - some expensive stuff you could argue shoukd last a decade. But thete is a limit of 6 years in England (and probably Wales, 5 years in Scotland) to bring a civil case so that sets a de-facto time limit.

I would suggest doing the defrost. My parents had a frost free freezer, and that packed up - ran for longer and longer (at reducing current from tge mains), eventually couldn't keep the temperature down.
It took something like 3 days to defrost.
Internally it had a finned heat exchanger, with a fan to blow air through it and round the cabinet. It also had a heater element so that the controller could warm the HE periodically to melt any ice and allow it to drain out. That bit didn't work properly.

Of course, if it does fix it, then it's faulty by definition as it's not "no frost, forever".

 

[aroominyork]

Thanks, Simon. I’m going to sound like a broken record but… you say that if the defrost fixes it then it’s faulty by definition as it’s not frost-free forever. And that the problem – if the defrost fixes it, I will know I have a “non-frost free freezer” but HiSense will tell me everything is OK so I should stop complaining! Do you see the problem?

 

[Simon47]

You go back to the retailer and tell them the freezer is not as described - what are they going to do about it ?
If you do call the manufacturer again, you could try a similar approach - "so are you telling me your advertusing was fraudulent then ?"
But there is something else - is it still keeping cold and running for a similar duty cycle on the compressor ? If so then I would suggest it's not badly iced up. Possibly partially, but not fully.

 

[aroominyork]

You go back to the retailer and tell them the freezer is not as described - what are they going to do about it ?
If you do call the manufacturer again, you could try a similar approach - "so are you telling me your advertusing was fraudulent then ?"
But there is something else - is it still keeping cold and running for a similar duty cycle on the compressor ? If so then I would suggest it's not badly iced up. Possibly partially, but not fully.

Yes, it's still keeping cold both in the fridge and freezer. Is that a clue to something?

 

[davesparks]

Sorry if I am being dense, but if ice is building up – that is the same as frost, is that right? – then doesn’t it mean there is a fault which is causing the frost to build up since we use it correctly and do not leave the door open?

Is it acceptable for them to say a “Total no frost: no frost, anywhere – ever!” appliance should be defrosted at least once or twice a year? We have no second freezer or other way to store the freezer’s contents for 24 hours.

It's a freezer, it's whole purpose is to freeze things so yes it will make frost and need defrosting occasionally.

Marketing people will write anything about a product in order to sell it, if you check the fine print carefully there will probably be some disclaimer to get them out of their lies.

 

[westward10]

If you never open the door and do not put food in it then the frost free aspect may work.

 

[Simon47]

It's a freezer, it's whole purpose is to freeze things so yes it will make frost and need defrosting occasionally.

If properly designed as "frost free" then it won't.
As i described above, such freezers typically have a finned heat exchanger (HE) with a fan that forces air flow through the HE and around the cabinet. Of course there will be condensation in the HE, and it will freeze - yer cannae defy the laws of physics.
But, if properly designed, the system will have a means of clearing that. In the case of my parents unit, it was a heater element embedded in the HE - so the controller could switch that one, warm up the HE, melt the frost, and it would then drain away. That could be a simplistic "every X hours, when fan and compressor aren't running, turn on heater for Y minutes", or it could be more subtle such as detecting when the compressor load changes, or the temperature of the HE goes lower than it should, and switching the heater on until the HE reaches a certain (above freezing) temperature.
Our current freezer has been running for something like 5 years without a defrost - so the system is working. My parents freezer would work fine for several years, then it would slowly degrade - my guess is that it failed to fully defrost, and over time the HE got more and more blocked, meaning that the ice gets more and more supercooled, and defrost becomes harder and harder.

This is a very different setup to the cheap (not frost free) system where there tends to be just evaporator pipes in contact with the freezer walls, or as a panel in the back, and which can never get above freezing without unloading the freezer and turning it off until it warms up.

Marketing people will write anything about a product in order to sell it, if you check the fine print carefully there will probably be some disclaimer to get them out of their lies.

Fine print will not get them out of that sort of thing. If a headline feature is "Frost free, forever" then that's what any reasonable consumer would expect. Courts take a dim view of "feature*" where "*" is defined in print too small for a gnat to read at the bottom of the advert or flyer.