The washing machine broke. Repair, complain or replace?

The washing machine stops halfway through a load. One person searches for the receipt, another looks up a new machine, and someone else suggests taking the old one apart. The family still needs clean clothes. It is easy to let urgency decide what happens next.

A calmer order can save money and protect your options:

1. make the situation safe
2. document what happened
3. check whether the seller may be responsible
4. only then compare paid repair and replacement

This guide concerns goods bought by consumers from professional sellers in Norway. Private sales, business purchases, services and purchases made under another country's rules may be different. It is practical information, not an assessment of an individual dispute.

First: stop, make it safe and preserve the evidence

If there is a possible safety problem, stop using the product and follow its manual. Do not keep testing an appliance that smells burnt, sparks, leaks near electricity or behaves in another worrying way. Disconnect it only if that is safe to do. For urgent danger, follow the relevant emergency guidance.

Norway's Directorate for Civil Protection says consumers may perform only a limited list of minor electrical jobs themselves. Electrical work outside that list must be left to qualified professionals. Replacing a plug or doing a simple check that the manual explicitly describes is not the same as opening an appliance and repairing its electrical parts. DSB, electrical work you may do yourself.

Before moving, resetting or dismantling the product, record what you can without taking a risk:

• the date and circumstances in which the fault appeared
• the error code and what the display shows
• a short photo or video of the fault, sound or leak
• the product's brand, model and serial number
• what you have already tried, such as the manual's reset procedure
• whether anything changed just before the fault, such as a power cut or a move

This is not about building a court case around every broken toaster. It gives the seller or repairer better information and helps the household avoid relying on memory.

Check your rights before ordering a repair

A broken product can lead down different paths. The cause may be a defect the seller is responsible for, normal wear, accidental damage, poor maintenance or something else. You do not have to diagnose that yourself before contacting the seller.

That order matters. If you pay an independent repairer or dismantle the product before giving the seller a chance to inspect and remedy a possible defect, the dispute may become harder. A professional diagnosis can be useful, but ask who will pay for it and what happens if the seller accepts or rejects the complaint.

A guarantee and statutory complaint rights are not the same

In Norway, a guarantee is an extra promise made voluntarily by a seller or manufacturer. It must give you something beyond the rights you already have by law. Its expiry does not automatically mean that your statutory rights have ended.

A statutory complaint—a reklamasjon—concerns rights under consumer law. For goods bought from a professional seller, the complaint period is normally two years. It is five years for products that, under normal use, are intended to last substantially longer. The Norwegian Consumer Council lists products such as phones, computers, televisions, washing machines, drills and hairdryers as examples that may have a five-year period. The period runs from delivery, not from the day the product breaks. Norwegian Consumer Council, complaint guide and guidance for electronics.

The length of the period is not a promise that every failure will be covered. The fault must still fall within the seller's legal responsibility. Age, expected life, price, normal wear, use and care can all matter.

Once you discover a possible defect, complain within a reasonable time. Complaining within two months is always considered timely, but the Consumer Council recommends acting as soon as possible. Write to the seller. The seller cannot simply require you to handle the matter with the manufacturer. Norwegian Consumer Council, complaint guide.

You do not necessarily need the original paper receipt. You must be able to make it likely that the product was bought from that seller and when; an order confirmation or bank transaction may help. A receipt remains the clearest starting point.

The purchase date changes the burden of proof

For goods bought from 1 January 2024, a defect that appears during the first two years is presumed to have been present at delivery unless the seller proves otherwise. For older purchases, the corresponding presumption was six months. This does not mean that every problem during the period is automatically a valid complaint; it changes who initially has to establish the cause. Norwegian Consumer Council, complaint guide and the government's legal overview of repair and consumer rights.

If the seller is responsible, repair or replacement should normally be carried out within a reasonable time, without cost and without substantial inconvenience to the consumer. Under the rules that apply to purchases from 2024, the starting point is that the seller gets one attempt to repair or replace the product, although another attempt may be reasonable in the circumstances. Older purchases can be governed by the earlier rules. If the remedy does not solve the matter, a price reduction or cancellation may become relevant. The precise outcome depends on the case.

Consumer rules can change, and transitional rules matter. Check the current guidance for the date of your purchase rather than relying only on a remembered rule.

Write a short complaint that is easy to act on

You do not need legal language. A useful message can include:

I bought [product, model] from you on [date]. On [date], it began to [brief description of fault]. It has been used and maintained in this way: [relevant facts]. I am making a statutory complaint and ask you to assess and remedy the defect. Photos/video and proof of purchase are attached. Please confirm the next step in writing.

Ask practical questions at the same time:

• Where should the product be delivered or collected?
• Is there a diagnostic charge if the complaint is rejected?
• Who covers transport?
• What is the expected assessment and remedy time?
• Is a loan product available if the repair causes significant inconvenience?
• Does the device contain personal data, and how should it be backed up or removed?

Keep the seller's answer, case number, delivery receipt and any workshop report. If you speak by phone, send a brief written summary afterwards. The Consumer Council's complaint guide also explains the next complaint bodies if you cannot resolve the matter with the seller. Norwegian Consumer Council, complaint guide.

If you must pay: compare more than the repair price

If the fault is not covered—or the product is old enough that a paid repair is the realistic route—ask for enough information to compare options fairly:

• the diagnostic fee and whether it is deducted from the repair
• a written estimate or a price ceiling before extra work begins
• which part failed and whether it is available
• the expected repair time
• how much useful life the repairer reasonably expects afterwards
• what guarantee applies to the repair and replacement part
• whether other known wear points are likely to fail soon
• the new product's full cost, delivery and removal—not only its campaign price

Energy and water use can matter for appliances, but a more efficient new product does not automatically make replacement the best economic or environmental choice. The answer depends on how often it is used, the size of the efficiency difference, the repair cost and how long both options are likely to last. Treat broad payback claims with caution unless they use your actual numbers.

Repair is also not always the responsible answer. Safety, missing parts, repeated failures, poor expected life or a repair close to replacement cost may point the other way. The goal is not “repair at any price”; it is an informed choice after the legal and practical options have been checked.

Why repair often feels harder than it sounds

The barriers are not just laziness or a lack of environmental concern. In a 2026 Consumer Council report, eight in ten respondents said repair was difficult or inaccessible, and two in three had discarded a product because spare parts were unavailable. Price was the main reason not to repair, and around three in four said a repair would need to cost less than a new product for them to choose it. These are reported experiences and preferences, not proof that every discarded product could or should have been repaired. Norwegian Consumer Council, When products die before their time.

Earlier SIFO research combined a representative survey of 1,196 people with interviews in the repair sector around Oslo. It found that complex appliances, special tools, uncertainty about cost and the time without the product could all raise the threshold for repair. The interviews also suggested that speed could be almost as important as price. Participants often confused guarantees with statutory complaint rights. SIFO, Leve av å reparere?, 2019.

The SIFO study is useful for understanding barriers, but it predates the 2024 consumer-law changes, and its repair-sector interviews were geographically limited. It should not be used as a source for today's legal rules or as a complete picture of every repair market.

Keep one household case file

The practical work often fails because the information is split between inboxes, drawers and family members. Give one person responsibility for the next action—not permanent responsibility for every appliance—and keep one small case file:

• product identity: brand, model and serial number
• purchase: date, seller, order number and proof of payment
• guarantee: terms and expiry, if relevant
• fault: date, description, error code, photos and video
• contact: complaint, case number and seller's replies
• service: diagnosis, estimate, transport and repair report
• outcome: repaired, replaced, refunded, recycled or awaiting action
• next step: owner and date

The file reduces duplicate calls and makes a handover possible if the person dealing with the case becomes busy.

How Famn can support the record

Famn cannot determine whether a defect is covered, calculate your legal complaint deadline or contact the seller. It can keep the household facts together.

In Famn, go to More → Holdings → your property → Items, and open or add the product. Under More details, you can record the brand, model, serial number, purchase date, retailer, purchase price, warranty expiry and warranty notes. Add the receipt, manual, fault photos and service report to the item so another household member can find the same material. See Famn's guide to items in Holdings.

Treat the warranty-expiry field as a reminder about the voluntary guarantee—not as the end of statutory complaint rights. The app does not make that legal assessment.

After a repair, update the notes or condition and attach the workshop report. If the manufacturer specifies recurring care, such as cleaning a filter or servicing a component, you can add maintenance to the item and let Famn create the recurring chores. Use the manufacturer's interval; do not invent one because it sounds tidy.

A ten-minute first response

When something breaks, the household can start with this checklist:

• Stop using the product if there may be a safety risk.
• Photograph the error, product label and surroundings.
• Record what happened and what the manual says.
• Find the purchase date, seller and proof of purchase.
• Check both statutory complaint rights and any guarantee.
• Contact the seller in writing before authorising independent work.
• Ask about diagnosis, transport, timing and possible charges.
• If paying yourself, compare repair and replacement using the same assumptions.
• Keep the decision, documents and next action in one shared place.
• Dispose of an unrepaired electrical product through an approved collection route.

The most useful habit is simple: check rights before repair cost. It turns a broken appliance from a rushed shopping decision into a manageable household case.

Sources and further reading

• Norwegian Consumer Council: complaint guide
• Norwegian Consumer Council: rights when electronics fail
• Norwegian Consumer Council: When products die before their time (2026)
• Norwegian government: legal framework for repair and consumer rights
• DSB: electrical work you may do yourself
• SIFO: Leve av å reparere? (2019)
• Famn Help: Items in Holdings