As energy bills are set to soar this October, many Brits will be looking for efficient ways to lower their use and cut costs.
Unfortunately, such an ordeal can can bring out those who seek to make money off the struggle of others. This can result in the selling of products which seemingly offer simple solutions, but are usually too good to be true.
Now, experts want people to be aware about certain "energy saving boxes" which are being sold online and claim to cut bills in half, but are actually faulty, reports Wales Online.
Consumer champions Which? have issued a warning over the devices for sale on sites including eBay and Amazon. Sellers of the gadget claim they can lower bills.
However, the professionals at Which? have said tests prove they do not work and could even be dangerous. Amazon and eBay have withdrawn a number of the products from sale.
The devices plug into a mains socket and sellers say they work by 'smoothing’ household voltage and ‘optimising’ the performance of appliances.
But Which? says its lab found no evidence that they work and found the boxes may be dangerous as they do not comply with British electrical safety standards.
The Office for Product Safety and Standards has issued four separate recall notices for similar devices on AliExpress, eBay, Wish and Motex.
Which? bought and tested six devices from Amazon and eBay after finding 110 on sale at a cost of between £10.99 and £23.64.
As well as finding no evidence the devices worked, all failed basic UK electrical safety standards and could be a potential fire and electric shock risk. Four of the plugs contained an unknown substance.
An eBay spokesman said: "We closely monitor UK, EU and US product safety databases and when unsafe products are added to these databases, we ban them from our site and update our block filters, which aim to prevent them from being relisted. These filters blocked 7.4m unsafe listings in 2021."
eBay says it has strict policies that make clear sellers must not mislead buyers.
An Amazon spokesman said: "We have proactive measures in place to prevent non-compliant products from being listed and we monitor the products sold in our stores for product safety concerns."
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