Just when you thought that this blog couldn’t possibly get any weirder, I present to you a picture of our Dyson vacuum cleaner.
I know, I hear you. Why? Well, it’s packed up. It’s sucked its’ last suck.
This evening it started emitting a strange burning smell so we turned it off and checked the belt thingy at the bottom. Many owners out there will know that, sometimes, this little belt can snap off and stop whizzing the brushes around. But this time it was OK, so we turned it back on. It seemed fine for a few seconds but then the motor started slowing down and the burning smell came back. We turned it off again and checked for blockages. The fantastic thing about these machines is that the Dyson company actively encourage you to take it to bits and check the pipes etc. Almost every part is removable by the owner and it helps to keep the Dyson working well.
But, when we turned it on again the motor spun a little, then slowed and then a large black cloud exploded out the side. Oh dear, the motor has gone bang.
We’ve got one of the original Dyson vacuums – it was built in the UK before Mr Dyson shipped his “proud UK company” out to bingo bongo land. I wasn’t looking forward to the conversation with their customer service team but I was pleasantly surprised. Within seconds the call was answered, and the call centre was in the UK too – the bloke understood what I was saying, I understood him! Within a minute he was looking at an engineer visit.
The guy at Dyson – Richard I think his name was – helped greatly and has restored my faith in large company customer service teams. Fantastic work Dyson, especially considering how old our machine is and the fact that we never bothered to register it or add an extended warranty. The Dyson guy, for example, didn’t follow screen prompts – I absolutely HATE the drones who follow these religiously, especially after my 2 hour phone call to Orange Broadband Customer Service in India on Sunday. That was a totally painful experience – it took a FULL FIVE MINUTES to get the guy to understand my moms’ PHONE NUMBER….. Useless! It seems he didn’t understand the word “double” or “triple” and “9” seems to sound too much like “5”.
Anyhow, we’ve now chosen to get a new Dyson because it turns out that the wood floor in the kitchen was probably part of the reason it failed. The one we have wasn’t designed for it, so we’re off to shell out for a different Dyson. I don’t mind though, because they’re good and ……..
…..wait a minute, I’m starting to worry about the fact that I’m STILL talking about our vacuum cleaner, so I’ll go now. :)