Consumer NZ survey reveals the most reliable appliance brand

3 June 2015

Consumer NZ survey reveals the most reliable appliance brands

Products may have become more complex in the past decade but their reliability hasn’t suffered according to the latest Consumer NZ survey. Since our annual appliance reliability survey started in 2006, the overall results have been trending up.

This year our survey gathered responses from more than 11,000 Consumer NZ members reporting on more than 39,000 appliances across 11 different product types. Overall, only 9 percent of appliances bought in the past five years needed any repairs.

However, not all types of appliance were equally reliable. Owners of ovens, espresso machines, washing machines and dishwashers bought in the past five years were more likely to have problems. While freezers, TVs, heat pumps and mobile phones were the least likely to break down. The worst performer was freestanding stoves, where nearly one in five owners reported needing repairs.

Several brands delivered excellent reliability. Miele topped the results for vacuum cleaners and washing machines with reliability exceeding 95 percent, and of more than 2000 Panasonic TVs, only 3 percent needed repair. Mitsubishi were the only brand to have no repairs reported at all for a product type – their freezers were 100 percent reliable.

The results show you can’t always buy better reliability, with Huawei mobile phones and Simpson washing machines and dishwashers proving more dependable than some “premium” brands.

The survey also asked owners how satisfied they were with their appliances and if they would recommend them to family and friends. In most cases, more reliable brands earned higher satisfaction and recommendation scores. However, espresso machines and washing machines bucked the trend. They both scored higher for satisfaction than reliability, suggesting owners looked at more than a trouble-free life to be happy with some products.

View the full article at: https://www.consumer.org.nz/articles/appliance-reliability
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