Peterborough couple’s lucky escape after Hotpoint oven explodes while in self-cleaning mode

Mark and Charlotte Lucas from Newborough were shocked to see glass from their new oven shatter all over the kitchen floor and thankfully miss both Charlotte and eight-year-old Lakeland Terrier Barley, whose cage was on the other side of the kitchen.

Charlotte said: “I was doing the washing up and the dog was sleeping in a cage. It frightened us both - I couldn’t stop shaking for over an hour.

“Thankfully he was not hurt but he was very shaken up. If the lock hadn’t stayed in situ the damage it would have done to anybody in its wake would have been horrible.”

The oven was one of two Hotpoint ovens Mark and Charlotte had bought through AO less than four months earlier.

On the morning of the explosion Charlotte had set one to do a pyrolytic clean which locks the door and can heat the inside up to 500 Celsius.

After the shocking incident the couple researched the issue and found other people had experienced similar problems, including another family from Peterborough.

Hotpoint is part of Whirlpool which is based in Woodston, but when Mark contacted the company he was left disappointed by its response.

He said: “We rang Hotpoint because it was a safety issue. Their response was less than satisfactory to put it mildly.

“They said we can call an engineer out but you may have to pay. They basically said if no fault was found we’d have to pay. It was a bit of a strange response. 

“They said they would get an engineer out but it would take a week. The following day we rang up AO and the response from them was really, really good. The lady on the phone helped us to escalate through Hotpoint who said the same thing again.

“AO got the broken oven taken away but Hotpoint didn’t want it back. 

“AO replaced the ovens with new makes. They were brilliant - I can’t fault their service.

“I can’t understand why Hotpoint has taken such a blasé approach. You’d think they would want to thoroughly investigate why something like this keeps happening. I said to the lady from Hotpoint that an easy search on the internet found similar stories elsewhere. She never tried to deny it.

“That’s what troubles me - you’d think they’d want to investigate further. They didn’t seem that bothered which was a bit weird.”
Charlotte added: “You wouldn’t want that happening to a family where you have a parent with a toddler walking around in the kitchen.”

A Whirlpool spokesperson said: “We are sorry to hear of this customer’s experience. After the customer contacted us we authorised a replacement product through their retailer and worked with them to resolve the matter as quickly as possible.

“We have spoken to the customer again and are pleased the matter is now resolved.”