Thousands of dishwashers 'unaccounted for' after safety recall over fire hazard concerns
By Chris Choi: Consumer Editor
Our research shows more than 844,000 dishwashers were sold with a fault that can cause fires.
Yet one of Britain's best known manufacturers, Hotpoint, delayed alerting its customers. Thousands of the appliances remain in homes.
It's led to fresh demands for change to Britain's recall system.
The dishwashers are sold under two labels:
Bosch Dishwasher FD 7901 to FD 8504
Hotpoint Dishwasher with serial numbers beginning DWF3 and DC26
These models were manufactured between 1999 and 2005 - though you may have bought one later than that.
Although many were sold as Hotpoint - they were actually made by Bosch. All 844,000 had the same fault which can lead to fires in the home.
Bosch sold 632,000, while Hotpoint sold 212,000. So far, Bosch has traced 187,043 and Hotpoint has found 8,295.
That means a total of 648,662 remain unaccounted for.
To check if you have one of the potentially unsafe dishwashers in your home check these company websites, which have all the details:
Sadly, there have been hundreds of incidents in people's homes caused by these fires. Bosch reports 410 and Hotpoint 38.
Both companies say that many of the machines are likely to have fallen out of use over the years since they were manufactured some time ago.
They have issued product recalls, but there was a striking difference in the timing of their safety alerts.
In July 2011, Bosch recalled 632,000 of the dishwashers. They had also made a further 212,000 which were sold under the Hotpoint brand.
These customers were not told for more than a further two years, in Nov 2013.
Hotpoint says it didn't think there would still be enough in use because the faulty appliances were between eight and 12 years old.
The company says it worked alongside Trading Standards. The manufacturer believes there are at least 51,705 still in use.
We have spoken to two customers who have had fires - Danny Nash and Robert Webb both believe the Hotpoint machines should have been recalled at the same time as Bosch issued its alert.
Hotpoint told ITV News:
Bosch said it has full safety recall details on its website.