A really sad story IMO
I am in the process of replacing my Miele washer and dryer set.
Paying 1000$ plus and waiting MONTHS for fixes on basic functionality is just ridiculous.
If it was stuff like optimization of interim spins (mine got a change there) we would be happy to get them no matter when.
Miele over here is raising their prices aswell.
Their BOL M-Touch machine could be had for under 1500€ - a "good deal" at that price for what you get.
Now they are 1750€ for the exact same machine.
They appear to have outsourced much of the actual coding, design and building to commonly known parts manufacturers (Bitron being one of them - the same that produced PCBs for BOL Bauknecht/Whirlpools, though I hope Miele speced longer lifetime and a high budget in return).
That's the outside optimization firm they contracted in years ago at work.
They did some smart and harmless things (like dropping the coupons for the empty TwinDos containers and making customers pay - sure it's 50€ more to spend, but at that price point that really dosen't matter and functionality is the same).
Take stop making all W1s 1600rpm - that would be fine if I had an option in the lower end with that.
But a lot of more recent stuff was a huge pain in the ass for the customer.
And funny enough - they mostly tackled the price competitive laundry sector.
Their DWs and kitchen appliances in general are still top notch.
And it's so basic quality insurance stuff.
All these fill issues are pretty basic typos in programming.
Somebody knowing what they programmed (and actually caring) could fix it in seconds.
This way they probably have a 3 month cycle of meeting with the outside company, telling them all the issues customers had, and hoping the update they create actually address all of them.
If not, the earliest that issue can be addressed again is 6 months later.
And Miele dosen't care.
They don't pay for these bug fix updates probably, and the customer already gave them their money.
Don't get me wrong, a MOL Miele will outperform most washers in most any way IMO.
And I would gladly recommend them for most people.
But I was looking on upgrading to something more premium.
And at the TOL, some very reputable companies are cheaper and from the standpoint of not delivering an unfinished product WAY ahead.
They have per se more technology for cheaper and are still known to be as reliable.
Why should I spend more on a Miele that might have such basic oversights as the wrong agitation being allocated to a cycle (yes, that's currently a thing here) if I can get an arguably more advanced and equally reliable machine for less?
There are things where you can cut costs and get away with it - outsourcing is great in that regard, since who solders the resistors to the boards dosen't really matter much.
It also frees you from a lot of liability - if a PCB breaks during the warranty period, you don't pay for it, you Bill it to the supplier.
But Quality Assurance can NEVER be one of these things if you charge the highest retail price for a washer in most EU markets.
And you clearly see that Miele just outsourced some parts of development that are time consuming and not really important - how the cycle is coded dosen't matter, just that it does what it is supposed to according to their specs.
And sure you assume they do the QA - but they don't cause it's freaking expensive.
That's why it has been outsourced in the first place.
And you can clearly see it in the issues popping up.
It's not that more washers are DOA (basically 0) or that they last significantly less than expected.
It's that a product is delivered, works perfectly fine in 95% of cases.
The hardware is ok - it was just an oversight in the 5% of the edge cases.
And since people spending that much on a washer usually care about those - it blows up in your face.
Examples on my set:
- The dryer has a terrible system to handle loads drying slower than expected. If it doesn't detect the load reaching the first drying degree after its initially allotted time - it just defaults to a max drying time and never senses again.
- I had that cooldown issue for 6 months making the washer potentially unusable in certain installations.
- Some cycles don't load size sense even if they should - a Cottons short 40C SHOULD differentiate between full load and partial load to set either PW or not. It doesn't.
And if I pay that much, that is just not something to chump change the customer on.
